From owner-freebsd-ports@FreeBSD.ORG Fri Jan 8 19:37:39 2010 Return-Path: Delivered-To: ports@FreeBSD.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 39BA7106566C for ; Fri, 8 Jan 2010 19:37:39 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from mi+thun@aldan.algebra.com) Received: from mail2.timeinc.net (mail2.timeinc.net [64.236.74.30]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D0FFB8FC1B for ; Fri, 8 Jan 2010 19:37:38 +0000 (UTC) Received: from mail.timeinc.net (mail.timeinc.net [64.12.55.166]) by mail2.timeinc.net (8.13.8/8.13.8) with ESMTP id o08JbbmZ027024 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=NO); Fri, 8 Jan 2010 14:37:38 -0500 Received: from ws-mteterin.dev.pathfinder.com (ws-mteterin.dev.pathfinder.com [209.251.223.173]) by mail.timeinc.net (8.13.8/8.13.8) with SMTP id o08JbbHP019727; Fri, 8 Jan 2010 14:37:37 -0500 Message-ID: <4B478981.9060707@aldan.algebra.com> Date: Fri, 08 Jan 2010 14:37:37 -0500 From: "Mikhail T." Organization: Virtual Estates, Inc. User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; uk; rv:1.9.1.5) Gecko/20091204 Thunderbird/3.0 MIME-Version: 1.0 To: John Merryweather Cooper References: <4B4772F4.5070601@aldan.algebra.com> <362458.2970.qm@web50704.mail.re2.yahoo.com> In-Reply-To: <362458.2970.qm@web50704.mail.re2.yahoo.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=KOI8-R; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Cc: ports@FreeBSD.org, karel@lovetemple.net, joerg@FreeBSD.org, mm@FreeBSD.org, eischen@vigrid.com Subject: Maintaining compiler front-ends (Re: The state of Ada) X-BeenThere: freebsd-ports@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Porting software to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 08 Jan 2010 19:37:39 -0000 01/08/10 13:10, John Merryweather Cooper ΞΑΠΙΣΑΧ(ΜΑ): > Well, the [Ada -mi] compiler needs to be upgraded to the latest version. Linux gets a compiler out of the box, but we have to bend one to shape. I remain convinced, that the "bending into shape" ought to begin with making the additional GNU compiler front-ends (be they Ada, or Lisp, Java, Fortran, Pascal, Objective C, etc.) addable to an already existing C-compiler. I find it crazy, that every such front end currently downloads and builds its own gcc-core-SOMEVERSION, instead of using the base gcc or DEPEND-ing on lang/gccSOMEVERSION. Yes, I am well aware, that this is, how GNU people do things. No, I don't think, there is nothing FreeBSD can do about it... Starting with making all such compilers use common binutils. (Perhaps, these can even be provided by the base -- NetBSD does just that, for example...) Once done, ports of front-ends will no longer have to each deal with the back-end making the maintainership easier and thus giving us better ports... -mi