From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Robert Lipe To: law@cygnus.com Cc: Louis Marascio , egcs@cygnus.com Subject: Re: Environment variable to pass in options? Date: Sun, 07 Dec 1997 19:12:00 -0000 Message-id: <19971207211054.34491@dgii.com> References: <28760.881545675@hurl.cygnus.com> X-SW-Source: 1997-12/msg00428.html > We already have a tough time getting all the information we need to > reproduce & fix problems. Adding an environment variable of this > nature just makes things harder since someone could put options in > the environment variable, then forgot to tell us about them when > they report a bug. SCO has had a similar feature in their tools for a long time. You can stuff things in environmental flags or in /etc/default/cc. I thoroughly hate this feature for the very reason Jeff describes. I have people constantly asking me "why does the compiler do XXX" and I spend a while beating on it and say, "it doesn't". They send a test case and say, "does too". I test their test case and say, "does not". This is when they find out the system admin or some other coworker added '-Obazillion -UseSomeEsotericThing' to one of the above places and that's causing the wierdness. Yes, I sometimes wish my compile lines would fit on a single 80 column screen to increase the density of my 'make' output. But after a couple rounds of playing the above game, I get over it.