cross development tools

[Kristof Vanbecelaere <kristof.vanbecelaere@sonycom.com>]

Hi,

A while ago H.J. Lu adviced to use -march/-mtune instead of -mcpu
options. But I wonder which front-end you need to use? It looks like
gcc-3.0.2 lists the option as a target-specific one but does not
accept it when you pass it.

I then decided to track down the port H.J. made and found it on the
ftp server but only in rpm form. I run a debian host for
development. I assume/hope the binaries will probably run on my host
if only I could get to their content. I know about alien but the
version of rpm (3.0.3) on my host does not accept the rpm packages
from the ftp site:

only packages with major numbers <= 3 are supported by this version of
RPM

And a newer version of rpm is available but in rpm form. A bit of a
problem. Why this bias towards Red Hat? Why not just tar files?

Also, I notice the compiler in H.J.'s port is something like
gcc-2.96.something. Assuming this is also the version of the
cross-compiler, how come I don't see this release on the official gcc
web page? How do his tools relate to the gcc releases?

I may be missing some historical background here,
Kristof