Re: Ada files now checked in

[Zack Weinberg <zack@codesourcery.com>]

I'm responding to all your mail at once.

On Sat, Oct 06, 2001 at 08:59:14PM -0400, Richard Kenner wrote:
>     It's my contention that the FSF tree needs to support a broader range
>     of situations than the ACT internal tree does.  
> 
> True, but that doesn't mean *every possible* situation.  There is no
> long-term reason why you would have a different driver name and there
> is no point in adding extra rules for such a transitory situation.

Vendor packaging will not change until well after the release of GCC
3.1.  I would estimate at least six months before they even consider
making it their default system compiler.  Therefore, the soonest that
there is likely to be a release of Linux or *BSD with "gcc" capable of
Ada is the end of 2002.  The soonest that it will be widespread enough
that we can even *consider* ignoring earlier configurations is 2004.

It is ridiculous to speak of a situation as "transitory" when its
duration is measured in years.

> "Wrong" or "right" isn't a meaningful term here.  The point is that
> neither FSF nor ACT has ever viewed this as a configuration that
> needs to be supported.

ACT may not have.  Given RMS's comments cited by Joseph, I am not
convinced the FSF agrees.  Please provide evidence for this statement.

>     This "short period" you refer to stretches from now until GCC >=3.1
>     (including Ada) is the default system compiler on every relevant
>     platform. 
>
> No, not at all.  Just until the *first time* gnat is build from a
> gnat1 and gnatbind.  Then you can just use what you built.  You
> don't have to wait for a release.

A system integrator packaging gnat will not be willing to do any such
thing.  They will, instead, create patches similar to the one I
submitted, so that they can build gnat without manual intervention
using the software they already have installed.

>     3. You have a complete gnat provided by your system integrator.
> 
> But there are few such.  The major one is SGI, and they call the
> driver "gcc".

Debian and Red Hat both call it "gnatgcc".  FreeBSD calls it "adagcc".
(NetBSD and OpenBSD don't seem to have native packages.)

ACT can pretend they don't exist.  We can't.

>     No.  I have either to do the manual procedure *every time I build the
>     compiler*, or I am not testing with the vendor-provided packages
>     anymore, and that is the whole point.
> 
> Why is that the "whole point"?  I often do "make install" and from then on
> use that compiler (both C and Ada) for my compilations.

It's the whole point because that most closely mimics what our users
do when they install GCC.  If I am not testing the same thing they
are, my tests do not provide any confidence in what will happen when
they do it.

> As Robert says, there is no assurance that any vendor-supplied GNAT can
> be used to bootstrap GNAT 5.0.  Perhaps the SGI-version can, but I'm not
> sure and don't particularly care.  That's what the gnat1 and gnatbind
> binaries will be for.

As I've said, if the existing packaged GNATs don't work, that is fine
by me.  What I object to is refusing to even let them try because they
happen not to have the official name.

zw