This is the mail archive of the gdb@sourceware.cygnus.com mailing list for the GDB project.


Index Nav: [Date Index] [Subject Index] [Author Index] [Thread Index]
Message Nav: [Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next]

Re: gdb and iso-c


Philippe De Muyter wrote:
> 
> Up to some years ago, gdb could be compiled by a K&R C compiler.
> Now, it can not anymore, and the change seems to be deliberate.

Dude, we discussed this over a year ago, and we even tested it by
including an deliberately ISO-only file in 4.18.  Not a single
user reported this as a problem with the 4.18 release, and I was
watching closely for such a complaint.

> It seems to me that the freedom of the gdb users is now restricted compared
> to the previous versions because of the need of an ISO-C compiler instead
> of any C compiler to compile it.
> 
> And I do not understand why the same reasons that apply to binutils and gcc
> do not hold for gdb.  gdb, because it is better than the debugger you get
> with your operating system, is needed to bootstrap the installation of
> gas, gld, or gcc in the likely case that not everything works well
> the first time.

Indeed, I sent our results back to RMS, saying that there didn't seem to
be any reason not to change the GNU coding standards for all GNU tools,
including GCC and binutils.  I don't know if he actually made the
change though.

So I think we've been sufficiently careful to ascertain whether the
modernization was justified, and there is no good reason to try to revive
K&R compat and the additional complexity that goes along with it.  In fact,
I've been a little disappointed that people haven't gone through random source
files, and simplified their sources by stripping out all the now-unneeded
K&R compat bits.

Stan

Index Nav: [Date Index] [Subject Index] [Author Index] [Thread Index]
Message Nav: [Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next]