> I still do not understand the Cygwin setup. It does not seem very intuitive > too me yet. I have run it several times.It took several minutes to install > and I now have the bash shell and other utilities. However, it did not > appear to install any GCC or CVS files.
The Cygwin setup is a little odd. But if you run it, and go through to the "select packages" screen, you can see a tree structure with the packages split up into different categories. Expand the "Devel" category to get all the development tools, including gcc and cvs. To rebuild binutils and gcc for a cross-compiler, you need a fair number of these tools - if you have a fast internet link, then just get the whole lot (except perhaps for gcc2, and oddities like tetex-devel). > > Can you please reccomend a GUI CVS? One that integrates with the File > Explorer would be great. I've downloaded a couple and a windows port of the cvs server (I think you'll get it via a google search for "win cvs") - a while ago, I was playing around trying to find out how cvs fits together, with the intention of using it for my own development. Of course, real work got in the way so I'm still xcopy'ing complete directory trees... There was one client called "Tortoise cvs" that had explorer integration, but I've not actually tried it out. > > >There are several users (like me) who have automated regular > > re-builds of msp430 gcc, for those who like to be on the cutting edge > > (although Andreas updates his builds regularly too, especially for > important > > fixes). If you have the time to try it, give it a shot - even if you > don't > > get things working straight away, you'll learn something. And come back > to > > us when you have problems, and we'll try and help you out. > > I will want to build the compiler eventually when I have time. In addition > to learning the GCC toll set better I would like to learn more about how a > compiler can optimizes code for a particular machine. I have seen some > 8-bit compilers such as a the ByteCraft C 6805 compiler that was often very > impressive in the generation of tight hand-tuned-like assembly. I have > always been curious about how that is done. In ByteCraft's case, the > developer told me they used some kind of artificial intelligence or expert > system. > I haven't dug into the code for the actual compiler at all - if I had the chance, I'd enjoy it too. If you manage to find any sort of reference material on how gcc back-ends work, I'd be grateful for some links. Maybe someday I could look at making a gcc port for one of the most horrible processor architecture I have ever seen - the Cop8.
