Extracting the abstract syntax tree from GCC

Posted Jan 15, 2015 13:37 UTC (Thu) by mpr22 (subscriber, #60784)
In reply to: Extracting the abstract syntax tree from GCC by xnox
Parent article: Extracting the abstract syntax tree from GCC

RMS's agenda to make the whole world open source is not secret or hidden. It's been well known for at least as long as I've been aware of GNU.

Extracting the abstract syntax tree from GCC

Posted Jan 15, 2015 17:25 UTC (Thu) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link] (2 responses)

No, but his technique of crippling implementations and keeping features in the stone age isn't widely advertised. :)

Serious question: why not just implement some of the Emacs features using libllvm? That way RMS can see first-hand exactly what is needed and why. That seems more productive and maybe even faster than spending years discussing it...?

I'd rather be coding!

Extracting the abstract syntax tree from GCC

Posted Jan 16, 2015 6:55 UTC (Fri) by MKesper (subscriber, #38539) [Link] (1 responses)

As I understood the article, the implementer started with something like that but was asked by RMS to use gcc instead.

Extracting the abstract syntax tree from GCC

Posted Jan 16, 2015 7:37 UTC (Fri) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link]

Ah, you're right. It's in a quote further down:

> It was you who told me to abandon libclang and choose GCC instead. And now that I'm working on that, I only get confronted with vague restrictions like "you may only export what you need for completions".

What a mess. Seriously, why not just go with llvm and ship something great? Once RMS comes to his senses (it can take years, and egcs demonstrates that having working code helps), the whole thing can be ported back to GCC.

Extracting the abstract syntax tree from GCC

Posted Jan 15, 2015 21:14 UTC (Thu) by Fats (guest, #14882) [Link] (6 responses)

> RMS's agenda to make the whole world open source is not secret or hidden

Wrong, his agenda is to make the whole world free software. Open source is for people without principles...

Extracting the abstract syntax tree from GCC

Posted Jan 16, 2015 18:04 UTC (Fri) by k8to (guest, #15413) [Link] (5 responses)

How even-handed.

Extracting the abstract syntax tree from GCC

Posted Jan 25, 2015 13:39 UTC (Sun) by dakas (guest, #88146) [Link] (4 responses)

Uh, Eric Raymond explicitly created the "Open Source" label exactly to appeal to industry players who considered bothering with principles suspicious. So yes, Open Source is for people without principles. That's not Stallman's pitch, but an explicit design goal of the Open Source agenda. To replace the appeal to principles, a bunch of technical and marketing criteria are propounded.

The dearth of actually successful Open Source companies (where Open Source is part of a permanent rather than an exit strategy) makes it pretty clear that this "realistic" advertising strategy is not actually founded in much realism.

Laws and society still largely favor proprietary solutions. RedHat is one company that is doing a lot for free software based on a proprietary service model. Google may be bleeding money from its Android enterprise, but comparatively little compared to the size of the project. But then the Android universe is not much interested in enabling free software. You may be able to get the source for much of the stuff, but tinkering with it requires jailbreaking and lots of work.

So even where Open Source/Free Software is successful in deployment, the financing has to come from less than free models.

Which means that principles are required after all to keep the freedom a running part of the whole: it does not pull its weight in the market all by itself. Never mind on whether you call it "Open Source".

Extracting the abstract syntax tree from GCC

Posted Jan 25, 2015 14:22 UTC (Sun) by vonbrand (subscriber, #4458) [Link] (3 responses)

Few Open Source companies as compared to none whatsoever in the Free Software camp says what?

Extracting the abstract syntax tree from GCC

Posted Jan 25, 2015 15:58 UTC (Sun) by spaetz (guest, #32870) [Link] (2 responses)

> Few Open Source companies as compared to none whatsoever in the Free Software camp says what?

PLEASE! Can we leave the snarky infighting polemics out?

There are not 'none' free software companiess by the way. Think of g10 code (gnupg), Igalia (calling themselves bnoth open source and Free software consultancy etc).

There are companies out there if you look for them, just no 800 pound gorillas.

Extracting the abstract syntax tree from GCC

Posted Jan 25, 2015 15:59 UTC (Sun) by cortana (subscriber, #24596) [Link] (1 responses)

Plus Redhat, Fluendo...

Extracting the abstract syntax tree from GCC

Posted Jan 25, 2015 22:32 UTC (Sun) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link]

Are those Free Software companies (as Stallman defines it) or Open Source Software companies?

I'm pretty sure that Stallman wouldn't count them as Free Software companies.