Andrew Pinski wrote: > > On Jul 23, 2006, at 11:48 AM, Mark Mitchell wrote: > >> >> Are you suggesting that we ship software that performs poorly on one of >> the most popular systems actually in the field because, in the abstract, >> those systems could be better? > > Maybe we just have to force the issue on people.
One of the purposes of FSF GCC development is to get more people to use GCC. That's more likely to happen if we make GCC work well for them. > We should not have a double standard here, just because it > is a performance issue and other people are confused about the current > behavior. We should not try so hard to be consistent that we do the wrong thing. It's good to have procedures and rules, but not to the point that they are absolutes. Decisions about these kinds of things are of necessity only semi-algorithmic. This isn't like a -f option which is a documented feature. This is the current behavior of the compiler, which I expect you'd find most people consider to be odd, despite the fact that there is some utility in the current approach. I think it would be wrong to make this change now (it's clearly neither Stage 3 nor regression-only material), but I see no reason not to make it in 4.2. >> /* On some versions of the OS, we have to do X to workaround Y. */ > > Yes but most of those because people don't think about filing bug reports. > We need to file the bug reports with the OS. Sure, filing OS bug reports is good. It's just orthogonal; we still have to build software that works with the systems users are using. -- Mark Mitchell CodeSourcery [EMAIL PROTECTED] (650) 331-3385 x713
