[svlug] Mandrake 8 beta thoughts

[Dagmar d'Surreal]

On Wed, 7 Mar 2001, Drew Bertola wrote:

> Dagmar d'Surreal writes:
> > 
> > I'll add one.
> > 
> >  7) Uses the ill-advised "2.96" version of gcc, meaning anything that was
> >    compiled with anyone else's compiler that you try to link into things
> >    build with it are almost guaranteed to explode.
> 
> Can you be specific?  Can you be exact to what is broken in "2.96?"
> What should be avoided?  Kernel compiles?  Certain module compiles?
> C++ cross compiles?  What?  
> 
> What troubles have you seen with gcc-2.96?

The same ones mentioned by the gcc developers about a week after RedHat
released it.  They specifically mentioned that if you have problems
building anything with a version of the compiler that called itself 2.96,
that you should be ashamed of yourself and won't be getting any help from
them.  (Well, not in those exact words, but the meaning was clear)

Some specific problems have to do with changes to the way symbols are
stored and handles in libraries.  For example, if you have a static
library that was built with 2.95.2 or egcs, or some other NON-EXPERIMENTAL
NON-CVS version of gcc, and you attempt to link it into an application you
compile with gcc-2.96, it will generall segfault and die the moment it
makes the first call into that library, if it doesn't just explode into a
bunch of pointy fragments during the linking (more common with shared
libraries than static ones).  (And while some people will claim that these
incidences are few and far between, I have already run into one case, and
the point of having these libraries is so they can be changed without
having to rebuild the entire system.)

Furthermore the gcc team even went so far as to say that there was a good
chance that the way symbols are handled might be changed *again* in a
manner that would introduce binary incompatibilites with 2.96 so that
expecting the rest of the world will eventually "catch up" to RedHat's
compiler was a seriously flawed assumption.

If they'd had any sense, they would have simply waited for 2.95.3 to be
released.  The Debian people don't seem to have a problem with waiting for
it, and I'm guessing that Volkerding doesn't have much of a problem with
waiting for it either, since the 2.95.3 version is currently in
slackware_current, which is known to be quite volatile and subject to
change at any time.

It seems to me that RedHat's problem is the likely the one they almost
always have... Somone from marketing sets a deadline, and forces the
engineers to meet it, no matter what the cost.  Right now for a reasonably
solid and secure box, one needs to be using a 2.2 version of glibc, which
breaks the hell out of gcc-2.95.2.  The gcc guys seem to have the bugs
worked out of the x86 side of things, and it looks like the only reason
they haven't released 2.95.3 officially yet is that most of the other
important platforms fail the crucial torture test for gcc miserably still.
It's just a matter of being patient... which isn't exactly a familiar
concept to people who primarily focus on meeting short-term revenue
expectations to keep stockholders happy.