Re: RFC: drop support for gcc < 4.0

Re: RFC: drop support for gcc < 4.0

[Glauber de Oliveira Costa]

On 8/21/07, Chris Wedgwood <cw@f00f.org> wrote:
> On Tue, Aug 21, 2007 at 07:35:50PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
>
> > Are there any architectures still requiring a gcc < 4.0 ?
>
> Yes, sadly in some places (embedded) there are people with older
> compiler who want newer kernels.

Last time I tried a mips build, it would fail the compile unless I was
using _exactly_ 3.4.4 (I didn't tried older versions, but did try
3.4.6, for ex.). So I also think the 3.4 series will still have to be
around for a while.

-- 
Glauber de Oliveira Costa.
"Free as in Freedom"
http://glommer.net

"The less confident you are, the more serious you have to act."

Re: RFC: drop support for gcc < 4.0

[Segher Boessenkool]

> Last time I tried a mips build, it would fail the compile unless I was
> using _exactly_ 3.4.4 (I didn't tried older versions, but did try
> 3.4.6, for ex.).

If 3.4.4 works where 3.4.6 doesn't, you should report this as a
bug; either here, or to the GCC team (but please be aware that the
3.4 series isn't supported anymore), or to whoever built that
compiler for you.

> So I also think the 3.4 series will still have to be
> around for a while.

Huh?  3.4 doesn't work for you, so that's why it should stay
a supported compiler?


Segher

Re: RFC: drop support for gcc < 4.0

[Glauber de Oliveira Costa]

On 8/21/07, Segher Boessenkool <segher@kernel.crashing.org> wrote:
> > Last time I tried a mips build, it would fail the compile unless I was
> > using _exactly_ 3.4.4 (I didn't tried older versions, but did try
> > 3.4.6, for ex.).
>
> If 3.4.4 works where 3.4.6 doesn't, you should report this as a
> bug; either here, or to the GCC team (but please be aware that the
> 3.4 series isn't supported anymore), or to whoever built that
> compiler for you.

I didn't bothered reporting it here because linux-mips website quotes
explicitly  the dependency on 3.4.4. So at least, I imagined they are
aware of it. (And as you said, no point in reporting it to gcc...)

> > So I also think the 3.4 series will still have to be
> > around for a while.
>
> Huh?  3.4 doesn't work for you, so that's why it should stay
> a supported compiler?

3.4.4 does. anyway, by this phrase, I only meant: "Dropping support
for 3.4 series won't help in this case"

-- 
Glauber de Oliveira Costa.
"Free as in Freedom"
http://glommer.net

"The less confident you are, the more serious you have to act."

Re: RFC: drop support for gcc < 4.0

[Jarek Poplawski]

On Wed, Aug 22, 2007 at 02:08:33AM +0200, Segher Boessenkool wrote:
> >>>How many people e.g. test -rc kernels compiled with gcc 3.2?

I confirm gcc version:

~/src/linux-2.6.23-rc3$ gcc -v
Reading specs from /usr/lib/gcc-lib/i486-slackware-linux/3.2.3/specs
Configured with: ../gcc-3.2.3/configure --prefix=/usr --enable-shared
 --enable-threads=posix --enable-__cxa_atexit --disable-checkingi
 --with-gnu-ld --verbose --target=i486-slackware-linux
 --host=i486-slackware-linux
Thread model: posix
gcc version 3.2.3

glibc-2.3.2

Sorry, you have to guess this, but, after reporting long time ago some
acpi make warnings, I didn't even suspect anybody would be interested
more this time...

It's an old box with Slackware 9.1, and this make is the last stage
of testing such a hot kernel version... But, according to README gcc
3.2 seems to be legal. (I hope there would be some warning about gcc
too old, anyway.)

Cheers,
Jarek P.

Re: RFC: drop support for gcc < 4.0

[Thomas Bogendoerfer]

On Tue, Aug 21, 2007 at 05:41:04PM -0300, Glauber de Oliveira Costa wrote:
> On 8/21/07, Chris Wedgwood <cw@f00f.org> wrote:
> > On Tue, Aug 21, 2007 at 07:35:50PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
> >
> > > Are there any architectures still requiring a gcc < 4.0 ?
> >
> > Yes, sadly in some places (embedded) there are people with older
> > compiler who want newer kernels.
> 
> Last time I tried a mips build, it would fail the compile unless I was
> using _exactly_ 3.4.4 (I didn't tried older versions, but did try
> 3.4.6, for ex.). So I also think the 3.4 series will still have to be
> around for a while.

that's fixed and I'm happiliy building the MIPS tree with gcc 3.3.3.
And I would be very unhappy to upgrade all my crosscompiler just because
someone thinks nobody build -rc kernel with older compilers. I do.

Thomas.

-- 
Crap can work. Given enough thrust pigs will fly, but it's not necessary a
good idea.                                                [ RFC1925, 2.3 ]

Re: RFC: drop support for gcc < 4.0

[Ralf Baechle]

On Tue, Aug 21, 2007 at 05:41:04PM -0300, Glauber de Oliveira Costa wrote:

> Last time I tried a mips build, it would fail the compile unless I was
> using _exactly_ 3.4.4 (I didn't tried older versions, but did try
> 3.4.6, for ex.). So I also think the 3.4 series will still have to be
> around for a while.

I don't know what broken MIPS platform you've tried.  I keep changing
between compiler versions all the time just so I can ensure builds with
older compilers keep working until we officially deciede to drop support
for them.  So the minimum compiler version for 32-bit MIPS kernels is
gcc 3.2 and for 64-bit kernel gcc 3.3.

But for sake of sanity and productivity I definately don't mind dumping
support for gcc < 4.0 or maybe even 4.1.  And while we're at it, let's
deprecate ancient binutils version as well.  A minimum version of 2.17
would be nice as I could get rid of lads of .word sillyness which is
needed to support older binutils.

  Ralf