[Petr Baudis] > I'm a bit lost here - the kernel uses tons of gcc extensions - how is > another compiler supposed to understand them? And if it is > specifically extended to understand them, isn't it likely that it'll > understand the -shared switch in gcc-like way as well?
There is a difference between $(CC) and $(HOSTCC). We have both of them for a reason. $(CC) specifies the compiler used to build the kernel - it may or may not be your regular system compiler. It can even be for another architecture - for example, it may produce PowerPC object files from the comfort (?) of your x86 PC. $(HOSTCC) is specifically to build executables that are to run *on* the build system itself - kconfig, for example. If you're running on x86 and building a PowerPC kernel, you need an x86 version of kconfig, not a PowerPC version. So $(CC) *must* be a gcc (or a convincing facsimile) - but $(HOSTCC) can be *any* C compiler on your system. I don't think anyone tries to use any gcc extensions with $(HOSTCC). > And how likely is situation when someone want to configure a kernel > with non-gcc compiler and actually build it with gcc? Not very likely, but you take a lot for granted. On many combinations of Unix + gcc versions, `gcc -shared' doesn't work until you spend half a day hand-tweaking the specs file whilst poring over the obscure flags section of the `ld' manpage. Try it for gcc 2.95 on AIX sometime, for a bit of good clean fun. My point was and is that while shared libraries are a (relative!) breeze on Linux, they have always been a horrible portability headache; furthermore, the kernel build system doesn't need them and ought to do without. Peter ------------------------------------------------------- This sf.net email is sponsored by: See the NEW Palm Tungsten T handheld. Power & Color in a compact size! http://ads.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/redirect.pl?palm0001en _______________________________________________ kbuild-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/kbuild-devel
