[committed] doc: Remove HSAIL from Language Standards

[committed] doc: Remove HSAIL from Language Standards

[Gerald Pfeifer]

Pushed.  

There's quite a number of further references in gcc/doc; is anyone
planning on continuing the deprecation and removing the actual bits?

Gerald


commit 7e999bd84f47205dc44b0f2dc90b53b3c888ca48
Author: Gerald Pfeifer <gerald@pfeifer.com>
Date:   Mon Dec 28 21:41:55 2020 +0100

    doc: Remove HSAIL from Language Standards
    
    Support for HSAIL has been deprecated with GCC 10 and their web server
    has been down for weeks.
    
    gcc/
    2020-12-28  Gerald Pfeifer  <gerald@pfeifer.com>
    
            * doc/standards.texi (HSAIL): Remove section.

diff --git a/gcc/doc/standards.texi b/gcc/doc/standards.texi
index fc5016028dd..974f9b7e46d 100644
--- a/gcc/doc/standards.texi
+++ b/gcc/doc/standards.texi
@@ -312,14 +312,6 @@ available online, see @uref{http://gcc.gnu.org/readings.html}
 As of the GCC 4.7.1 release, GCC supports the Go 1 language standard,
 described at @uref{https://golang.org/doc/go1}.
 
-@section HSA Intermediate Language (HSAIL)
-
-GCC can compile the binary representation (BRIG) of the HSAIL text format as
-described in HSA Programmer's Reference Manual version 1.0.1. This
-capability is typically utilized to implement the HSA runtime API's HSAIL 
-finalization extension for a gcc supported processor. HSA standards are
-freely available at @uref{http://www.hsafoundation.com/standards/}.
-
 @section D language
 
 GCC supports the D 2.0 programming language.  The D language itself is

Re: [committed] doc: Remove HSAIL from Language Standards

[Martin Jambor]

Hi Gerald,

On Mon, Dec 28 2020, Gerald Pfeifer wrote:
> Pushed.  
>
> There's quite a number of further references in gcc/doc; is anyone
> planning on continuing the deprecation and removing the actual bits?
>
> Gerald
>
>
> commit 7e999bd84f47205dc44b0f2dc90b53b3c888ca48
> Author: Gerald Pfeifer <gerald@pfeifer.com>
> Date:   Mon Dec 28 21:41:55 2020 +0100
>
>     doc: Remove HSAIL from Language Standards
>     
>     Support for HSAIL has been deprecated with GCC 10 and their web server
>     has been down for weeks.
>     
>     gcc/
>     2020-12-28  Gerald Pfeifer  <gerald@pfeifer.com>
>     
>             * doc/standards.texi (HSAIL): Remove section.
>

The HSAIL/BRIG consuming front-end has not been removed, as opposed to
the HSAIL/BRIG emitting back-end which was, and is still part of the
compiler, so this should not have been applied, I'm afraid.

Given the state of HSAIL, the front-end is probably not very useful
either and so we may remove it in near term too, but it seems to still
mostly work and causes no trouble, so at least for now it stayed.

Can you please revert this?

Thanks,

Martin


> diff --git a/gcc/doc/standards.texi b/gcc/doc/standards.texi
> index fc5016028dd..974f9b7e46d 100644
> --- a/gcc/doc/standards.texi
> +++ b/gcc/doc/standards.texi
> @@ -312,14 +312,6 @@ available online, see @uref{http://gcc.gnu.org/readings.html}
>  As of the GCC 4.7.1 release, GCC supports the Go 1 language standard,
>  described at @uref{https://golang.org/doc/go1}.
>  
> -@section HSA Intermediate Language (HSAIL)
> -
> -GCC can compile the binary representation (BRIG) of the HSAIL text format as
> -described in HSA Programmer's Reference Manual version 1.0.1. This
> -capability is typically utilized to implement the HSA runtime API's HSAIL 
> -finalization extension for a gcc supported processor. HSA standards are
> -freely available at @uref{http://www.hsafoundation.com/standards/}.
> -
>  @section D language
>  
>  GCC supports the D 2.0 programming language.  The D language itself is

Re: [committed] doc: Remove HSAIL from Language Standards

[Gerald Pfeifer]

On Tue, 29 Dec 2020, Martin Jambor wrote:
>> commit 7e999bd84f47205dc44b0f2dc90b53b3c888ca48
>> Author: Gerald Pfeifer <gerald@pfeifer.com>
>> Date:   Mon Dec 28 21:41:55 2020 +0100
>>
>>     doc: Remove HSAIL from Language Standards
>>     
>>     Support for HSAIL has been deprecated with GCC 10 and their web server
>>     has been down for weeks.

Please note the above.

> The HSAIL/BRIG consuming front-end has not been removed, as opposed to
> the HSAIL/BRIG emitting back-end which was, and is still part of the
> compiler, so this should not have been applied, I'm afraid.

This section in the documentation is about language standards and
reference to those standards.  hsafoundation.com literally has been
dead for a while, and there is not (evident) other location where
the standard appears vailable.

Also, wasn't the latest version 1.0.3 whereas our doc snippet still
referred to 1.0.1.

> Given the state of HSAIL, the front-end is probably not very useful
> either and so we may remove it in near term too, but it seems to still
> mostly work and causes no trouble, so at least for now it stayed.
> 
> Can you please revert this?

A simple revert does not appear appropriate, but if you have a strong
preference and see a benefit for our users, we surely can put something 
back in again.  

In that case, should the version updated to 1.0.3?  Apart from that 
and the defunct web site, what are other changes compared to the status 
pre commit 7e999bd84f47205dc44b0f2dc90b53b3c888ca48 ?

Can you propose some text / changes taking into account the deprecation
and related developments?  Can be rough, and I'll take care of the patch.

Gerald

Re: [committed] doc: Remove HSAIL from Language Standards

[Martin Jambor]

Hi Gerald,

On Tue, Dec 29 2020, Gerald Pfeifer wrote:
> On Tue, 29 Dec 2020, Martin Jambor wrote:
>>> commit 7e999bd84f47205dc44b0f2dc90b53b3c888ca48
>>> Author: Gerald Pfeifer <gerald@pfeifer.com>
>>> Date:   Mon Dec 28 21:41:55 2020 +0100
>>>
>>>     doc: Remove HSAIL from Language Standards
>>>     
>>>     Support for HSAIL has been deprecated with GCC 10 and their web server
>>>     has been down for weeks.
>
> Please note the above.

HSAIL front-end has not been deprecated, at least as far as I know.
Look at the last paragraph in
https://gcc.gnu.org/pipermail/gcc/2020-April/000330.html

I trust you that HSA Foundation's web server was down for weeks but it
is not down now, http://www.hsafoundation.com/standards/ loads for me
fine and "HSA Programmer Reference Manual Specification 1.01" available
from that page describes the HSAIL that the FE implements.

>
>> The HSAIL/BRIG consuming front-end has not been removed, as opposed to
>> the HSAIL/BRIG emitting back-end which was, and is still part of the
>> compiler, so this should not have been applied, I'm afraid.
>
> This section in the documentation is about language standards and
> reference to those standards.  hsafoundation.com literally has been
> dead for a while, and there is not (evident) other location where
> the standard appears vailable.
>
> Also, wasn't the latest version 1.0.3 whereas our doc snippet still
> referred to 1.0.1.

The last one is 1.2 but our FE only supports 1.0.1.  I have forgotten
the differences between the two and am too lazy to go dig for them now
but the reference to the standard version was correct.

>
>> Given the state of HSAIL, the front-end is probably not very useful
>> either and so we may remove it in near term too, but it seems to still
>> mostly work and causes no trouble, so at least for now it stayed.
>> 
>> Can you please revert this?
>
> A simple revert does not appear appropriate, but if you have a strong
> preference and see a benefit for our users, we surely can put something 
> back in again.  
>
> In that case, should the version updated to 1.0.3?  Apart from that 
> and the defunct web site, what are other changes compared to the status 
> pre commit 7e999bd84f47205dc44b0f2dc90b53b3c888ca48 ?
>
> Can you propose some text / changes taking into account the deprecation
> and related developments?  Can be rough, and I'll take care of the patch.

Given that hsafoundation.com works and the version of the standard
referenced in the removed text was correct, I still think that simply
reverting the patch is the simplest and correct thing to do.

Given that nobody bothered to update the FE to HSAIL 1.2 (which is 2.5
years old) and it is unlikely to have many users, maybe it is time to
deprecate the FE in GCC 11 (I guess it is not a promise to remove it in
12), but that is a different question.

Thanks,

Martin

Re: [committed] doc: Remove HSAIL from Language Standards

[Gerald Pfeifer]

On Mon, 4 Jan 2021, Martin Jambor wrote:
> I trust you that HSA Foundation's web server was down for weeks but it
> is not down now, http://www.hsafoundation.com/standards/ loads for me
> fine and "HSA Programmer Reference Manual Specification 1.01" available
> from that page describes the HSAIL that the FE implements.

Thanks for checking that again, Martin. I have applied the patch
below, reverting the original commit.

> Given that nobody bothered to update the FE to HSAIL 1.2 (which is 2.5
> years old) and it is unlikely to have many users, maybe it is time to
> deprecate the FE in GCC 11 (I guess it is not a promise to remove it in
> 12), but that is a different question.

I think I'd recommend that, yes.

Cheers, Gerald


commit ad92bf4b165935b58195825dc8f089f53fd2710b
Author: Gerald Pfeifer <gerald@pfeifer.com>
Date:   Wed Jan 6 00:56:55 2021 +0100

    doc: Re-add HSAIL to Language Standards
    
    The HSAIL web server has reappeared after weeks, so restore the standard
    reference for now while we consider further deprecation.
    
    This reverts commit 7e999bd84f47205dc44b0f2dc90b53b3c888ca48.
    
    gcc/
    2021-01-06  Gerald Pfeifer  <gerald@pfeifer.com>
    
            Revert:
            2020-12-28  Gerald Pfeifer  <gerald@pfeifer.com>
    
            * doc/standards.texi (HSAIL): Remove section.

diff --git a/gcc/doc/standards.texi b/gcc/doc/standards.texi
index 128b1c67bbc..0f88333eec6 100644
--- a/gcc/doc/standards.texi
+++ b/gcc/doc/standards.texi
@@ -320,6 +320,14 @@ available online, see @uref{http://gcc.gnu.org/readings.html}
 As of the GCC 4.7.1 release, GCC supports the Go 1 language standard,
 described at @uref{https://golang.org/doc/go1}.
 
+@section HSA Intermediate Language (HSAIL)
+
+GCC can compile the binary representation (BRIG) of the HSAIL text format as
+described in HSA Programmer's Reference Manual version 1.0.1. This
+capability is typically utilized to implement the HSA runtime API's HSAIL 
+finalization extension for a gcc supported processor. HSA standards are
+freely available at @uref{http://www.hsafoundation.com/standards/}.
+
 @section D language
 
 GCC supports the D 2.0 programming language.  The D language itself is

[PATCH] Deprecate the BRIG/HSAIL front-end (Was: Re: [committed] doc: Remove HSAIL from Language Standards)

[Martin Jambor]

Hi,

On Wed, Jan 06 2021, Gerald Pfeifer wrote:
> On Mon, 4 Jan 2021, Martin Jambor wrote:
>> Given that nobody bothered to update the FE to HSAIL 1.2 (which is 2.5
>> years old) and it is unlikely to have many users, maybe it is time to
>> deprecate the FE in GCC 11 (I guess it is not a promise to remove it in
>> 12), but that is a different question.
>
> I think I'd recommend that, yes.
>

I have discussed this with Pekka and we concluded that deprecating the
HSAIL/BRIG front-end is the right thing to do.  Therefore, I'd like to
propose the following patch to the documentation repo.  Is it OK?

Thanks,

Martin


diff --git a/htdocs/gcc-11/changes.html b/htdocs/gcc-11/changes.html
index 9d2e4f29..a5dade94 100644
--- a/htdocs/gcc-11/changes.html
+++ b/htdocs/gcc-11/changes.html
@@ -58,6 +58,10 @@ a work-in-progress.</p>
       is deprecated and will be removed in a future release. It should be
       possible to use <code>--enable-cheaders=c_global</code> (the default)
       with no change in behaviour. </li>
+
+  <li>The front-end for compiling BRIG format of Heterogeneous System
+      Architecture Intermediate Language (HSAIL) has been deprecated
+      and will likely be removed in a future release.</li>
 </ul>
 
 

Re: [PATCH] Deprecate the BRIG/HSAIL front-end (Was: Re: [committed] doc: Remove HSAIL from Language Standards)

[Gerald Pfeifer]

On Tue, 26 Jan 2021, Martin Jambor wrote:
> I have discussed this with Pekka and we concluded that deprecating the
> HSAIL/BRIG front-end is the right thing to do.  Therefore, I'd like to
> propose the following patch to the documentation repo.  Is it OK?

> +  <li>The front-end for compiling BRIG format of Heterogeneous System
> +      Architecture Intermediate Language (HSAIL) has been deprecated
> +      and will likely be removed in a future release.</li>

Please use "front end" for the noun, per codingconventions.html .

This looks fine with that little change.

Thanks,
Gerald