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

Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft

Posted Jan 30, 2014 0:03 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304)
In reply to: Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft by PaXTeam
Parent article: Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft

The GCC API, if API there is, is much wider than merely the public symbols. It also encompasses the data representations being passed around (which are, this being a compiler, both not exactly simple and utterly core to what it's doing) and even the names and orders of the compiler passes involved (since plugins have to say where they fit in the compilation process).

The GCC API is *huge*, and probably every tenth commit to GCC changes it in some subtle way. :)

(gods. I'm agreeing with PaXTeam. Just gotta check outside to see if the stars are falling from the sky: the world is clearly overdue for ending.)

to post comments

Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft

Posted Jan 30, 2014 0:38 UTC (Thu) by PaXTeam (guest, #24616) [Link]

> The GCC API, if API there is, is much wider than merely the public symbols.

yeah, it's kinda implied since without knowing all the data types/etc you can hardly make use of these functions/etc ;). that said in my experience the churn in say linux causes a whole lot more extra work for me than changes in gcc. i wish i could get most of my forward ports done with a simple compatibility header like i have for gcc (at least until they turn gimple and tree into classes :).