[Bug fortran/24357] New: whither ratfor?

[Bug fortran/24357] New: whither ratfor?

[wilson at gcc dot gnu dot org]

The ratfor support broke when we dropped the old f77 front end.

aretha$ touch tmp.r
aretha$ ./xgcc -B./ tmp.r
xgcc: tmp.r: Ratfor compiler not installed on this system
aretha$

This is the default message we get when a language hasn't been configured in,
but I did configure in the fortran compiler and hence something more
interesting should have happened.

An older compiler (gcc 3.3.3) gives me
aretha$ gcc tmp.r
gcc: installation problem, cannot exec `ratfor': No such file or directory
aretha$
which would have worked if I had the ratfor preprocessor installed.

It isn't clear to me if we should be dropping the ratfor support, or if we
should be fixing it.  Hence this PR.  A web search shows that the language is
still alive, but I can't recall the last time someone mentioned it on a gcc
list.

If we want to fix it, then we need to add a @ratfor spec to the
fortran/lang-specs.h file.  Perhaps just one copied from the old f77 front end
would do.

If we want to remove it, then we need to delete the .r filename docs from
doc/invoke.texi.  We need to delete ratfor from the -x language list.  And we
need to delete the default .r support in the gcc.c file.


-- 
           Summary: whither ratfor?
           Product: gcc
           Version: 4.1.0
            Status: UNCONFIRMED
          Severity: normal
          Priority: P2
         Component: fortran
        AssignedTo: unassigned at gcc dot gnu dot org
        ReportedBy: wilson at gcc dot gnu dot org


http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=24357

[Bug fortran/24357] whither ratfor?

[pinskia at gcc dot gnu dot org]

------- Comment #1 from pinskia at gcc dot gnu dot org  2005-10-14 02:53 -------
There looks like ratfor90 also.

See http://sepwww.stanford.edu/software/ratfor90.html

Confirmed.


-- 

pinskia at gcc dot gnu dot org changed:

           What    |Removed                     |Added
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
             Status|UNCONFIRMED                 |NEW
     Ever Confirmed|0                           |1
   Last reconfirmed|0000-00-00 00:00:00         |2005-10-14 02:53:16
               date|                            |


http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=24357

[Bug fortran/24357] whither ratfor?

[tobi at gcc dot gnu dot org]

------- Comment #2 from tobi at gcc dot gnu dot org  2005-11-01 20:25 -------
I'd say, if someone wants to implement the necessary specs, he's free to do so,
but for the time being, we can remove the support from invoke.texi, and gcc.c.


-- 

tobi at gcc dot gnu dot org changed:

           What    |Removed                     |Added
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                 CC|                            |tobi at gcc dot gnu dot org
         AssignedTo|unassigned at gcc dot gnu   |tobi at gcc dot gnu dot org
                   |dot org                     |
             Status|NEW                         |ASSIGNED
   Last reconfirmed|2005-10-14 02:53:16         |2005-11-01 20:25:02
               date|                            |


http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=24357

[Bug fortran/24357] whither ratfor?

[tobi at gcc dot gnu dot org]

------- Comment #3 from tobi at gcc dot gnu dot org  2005-11-16 10:58 -------
Subject: Bug 24357

Author: tobi
Date: Wed Nov 16 10:58:41 2005
New Revision: 107078

URL: http://gcc.gnu.org/viewcvs?root=gcc&view=rev&rev=107078
Log:
        PR 24357
        * doc/invoke.texi: Distinguish between free and fixed form instead of
        Fortran and Fortran 90/95.  Remove ratfor from the list of supported
        languages.
        * gcc.c (default_compilers): Remove double entries, add entries for
        suffixes '.F90' and '.F95'.


Modified:
    trunk/gcc/ChangeLog
    trunk/gcc/doc/invoke.texi
    trunk/gcc/gcc.c


-- 


http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=24357

[Bug fortran/24357] whither ratfor?

[tobi at gcc dot gnu dot org]

------- Comment #4 from tobi at gcc dot gnu dot org  2005-11-16 11:00 -------
Fixed on the trunk, 4.0 is still waiting for approval.


-- 

tobi at gcc dot gnu dot org changed:

           What    |Removed                     |Added
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
             Status|ASSIGNED                    |RESOLVED
         Resolution|                            |FIXED
   Target Milestone|---                         |4.1.0


http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=24357

[Bug fortran/24357] whither ratfor?

[nicolas dot brouard at libertysurf dot fr]

------- Comment #5 from nicolas dot brouard at libertysurf dot fr  2006-05-08 22:03 -------
May I add a comment on Ratfor. 
Ratfor is an ancestor of C, it has been widely used since the 80's. How can you
suppress such a facility without any survey of who is still using it? I am not
saying who is still writing new softwares with it, but who is still compiling
old  scientific softwares still written in ratfor. I have been using Ratfiv
since the 80's,  (ratfor->rat4->ratfiv) and recently (2 years ago) built a
Mandrake rpm for  ratfiv. The advantage of ratfiv (Institute of Cancer
Research) over ratfor was the easier way of programming. Ratfiv was able to
output fortran77 on Vax machines. Ratfiv was also written in ratfiv itself and
therefore was able to bootstrap (from original fortran sources)  and this is
different from the classical ratfor compiled in C.

Since the rpm was built, some programmers have used it and reported bugs to
Mandriva bugzilla which means that ratfor (or ratfiv) users using the Fortran
code still exist.

Please let ratfor survive. What the problem with it?
I love gcc -o foo foo.r 
And unfortunately with gcc 4.1 and gcc -v foo foo.r I get a message
 "Ratfor compiler not installed on this system"
and this is wrong. In earlier version we got
 ratfor  -v -o /home/brouard/tmp/ccmkIREO.f foo.r

If there is no performance question please keep ratfor using f95. I compiled
fortran output of ratfor programme and their is no problem.


-- 

nicolas dot brouard at libertysurf dot fr changed:

           What    |Removed                     |Added
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                 CC|                            |nicolas dot brouard at
                   |                            |libertysurf dot fr


http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=24357