Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft [LWN.net]

Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft

Posted Jan 27, 2014 11:35 UTC (Mon) by jezuch (subscriber, #52988)
In reply to: Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft by Del-
Parent article: Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft

> This sounds incredibly stupid. Stable API's is the back-bone of any successful open project.

*External* APIs, yes. I think they're talking about internal APIs. Just like Linux explicitly does not support stable internal API, for [I suppose?] exactly the same reasons.

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Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft

Posted Jan 27, 2014 20:29 UTC (Mon) by Del- (guest, #72641) [Link] (1 responses)

> *External* APIs, yes. I think they're talking about internal APIs. Just like Linux explicitly does not support stable internal API, for [I suppose?] exactly the same reasons.

In the case of linux you are probably referring to the lack of an ABI to drivers, which is done quite deliberately since it is copy-left and hence drivers are supposed to also be GPL. The case for LLVM is quite different.

That said, Octave actually uses LLVM as a JIT library. This is AFAIK the usage scenario where LLVM really shines today, and hence could hardly count as an "internal" API. Are you just guessing in the dark here, or have you actually checked it out? I am glad to be proven wrong, but then I appreciate a bit more content in your post.

Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft

Posted Jan 28, 2014 8:02 UTC (Tue) by jezuch (subscriber, #52988) [Link]

> That said, Octave actually uses LLVM as a JIT library. This is AFAIK the usage scenario where LLVM really shines today, and hence could hardly count as an "internal" API. Are you just guessing in the dark here, or have you actually checked it out? I am glad to be proven wrong, but then I appreciate a bit more content in your post.

Just guessing, sorry. I'll admit mistake and let more knowledgeable people speak :)