Date: Sun, 22 Jan 2012 12:52:17 -0700 From: Chad Perrin <perrin@apotheon.com> To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Clang - what is the story? Message-ID: <20120122195217.GB857@hemlock.hydra> In-Reply-To: <4F1C27AD.9070608@herveybayaustralia.com.au> References: <201201221438.q0MEcYov066825@mail.r-bonomi.com> <4F1C27AD.9070608@herveybayaustralia.com.au>
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On Mon, Jan 23, 2012 at 01:13:49AM +1000, Da Rock wrote:
> On 01/23/12 00:38, Robert Bonomi wrote:
> >Da Rock<freebsd-questions@herveybayaustralia.com.au> wrote:
> >
> >>I personally had no idea this was going on; my impression was gcc grew
> >>out of the original compiler that built unix, and the only choices were
> >>borland and gcc. The former for win32 crap and the latter for, well,
> >>everything else.
> >"Once upon a time", there were _many_ alternatives for C compilers.
> >Commercial -- i.e. 'you pay for it', or bundled with a pay O/S -- offerings
> >included (this is a _partial_ list, ones _I_ have personal knowledge of):
> >
> > PCC -- (the original one0 medium-lousy code but the code-generator was
> > easily adapted to new/diferent hardwre
> > Green Hills Softwaware (used by a number of unix hardare manufacturers)
> > Sun Microsystems developed their own ("acc")
> > Silicon Graphics, Inc
> > Hewlett-Packard
> > Symantic (Think C -- notable for high-performance on early Apple Mac's,
> > significantly better than Apple's own MPW)
> > Manx Software ("Aztec C" -- a 'best of breed' for MS-DOS)
> > Microsoft
> > Intel
> > CCS
> > Watcom
> > Borland
> > Zortech
> > Greenleaf Software
> > Ellis Computing (specializing in 'budget' compilers, circa $30 pricetags)
> > "Small C"
> > tcc -- the 'tiny C compiler
> Wow... I have some research to do...
Maybe not. It depends on what you want to learn.
PCC was already mentioned. Watcom C's license is overly complex and
probably legally problematic. Small-C Compiler is a compiler for the
Small-C language, which is only a subset of C. The Tiny C Compiler is
copyleft licensed, so not as ideal a choice as Clang, PCC, and TenDRA
have been at various points in time when choosing a new C compiler for a
BSD Unix base system. If I'm not mistaken, everything else on that list
is not even open source software.
If you just want to know about C compilers, it's fun to read about all
this stuff. If you specifically want to know about options that might be
suitable for use as GCC-replacement in BSD Unix systems, there's far less
to read.
--
Chad Perrin [ original content licensed OWL: http://owl.apotheon.org ]
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