From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: from gate.crashing.org ([63.228.1.57]:46273 "EHLO gate.crashing.org" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1751296AbXHVAJs (ORCPT ); Tue, 21 Aug 2007 20:09:48 -0400 In-Reply-To: <20070821212129.GG30705@stusta.de> References: <20070821132038.GA22254@ff.dom.local> <20070821093103.3c097d4a.randy.dunlap@oracle.com> <20070821173550.GC30705@stusta.de> <20070821191959.GC2642@bingen.suse.de> <20070821195433.GE30705@stusta.de> <20070821202113.GF30705@stusta.de> <27c412eea99f1f80a3002e9668bd31f8@kernel.crashing.org> <20070821212129.GG30705@stusta.de> Mime-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v623) Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed Message-Id: <17c0b56b663fce6f28b46e3c42dfbaf9@kernel.crashing.org> Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit From: Segher Boessenkool Subject: Re: RFC: drop support for gcc < 4.0 Date: Wed, 22 Aug 2007 02:08:33 +0200 Sender: linux-arch-owner@vger.kernel.org To: Adrian Bunk Cc: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, Andrew Morton , Linus Torvalds , Jarek Poplawski , Andi Kleen , linux-arch@vger.kernel.org, Randy Dunlap List-ID: >>> How many people e.g. test -rc kernels compiled with gcc 3.2? >> >> Why would that matter? It either works or not. If it doesn't >> work, it can either be fixed, or support for that old compiler >> version can be removed. > > One bug report "kernel doesn't work / crash / ... when compiled with > gcc 3.2, but works when compiled with gcc 4.2" will most likely be lost > in the big pile of unhandled bugs, not cause the removal of gcc 3.2 > support... While that might be true, it's a separate problem. >> The only other policy than "only remove support if things are >> badly broken" would be "only support what the GCC team supports", >> which would be >= 4.1 now; and there are very good arguments for >> supporting more than that with the Linux kernel. > > No, it's not about bugs in gcc, it's about kernel+gcc combinations that > are mostly untested but officially supported. What does "officially supported" mean? Especially the "officially" part. Is this documented somewhere? > E.g. how many kernel developers use kernels compiled without > unit-at-a-time? And unit-at-a-time does paper over some bugs, > e.g. at about half a dozen section mismatch bugs I've fixed > recently are not present with it. If any developer is interested in supporting some certain old compiler version, he should be testing regularly with it. Sounds like that's you ;-) If no developer is interested, we shouldn't claim to support using that compiler version. > But as the discussions have shown gcc 4.0 is currently too high for > making a cut, and it is not yet the right time for raising the minimum > required gcc version. Agreed. Segher