The following reply was made to PR port-xen/29887; it has been noted by GNATS.

From: Joerg Sonnenberger <joerg@britannica.bec.de>
To: tech-userlevel@NetBSD.org
Cc: Jason Thorpe <thorpej@shagadelic.org>,
	Bill Studenmund <wrstuden@NetBSD.org>,
	YAMAMOTO Takashi <yamt@mwd.biglobe.ne.jp>, jhawk@MIT.EDU,
	christos@zoulas.com, gnats-bugs@NetBSD.org,
	port-xen-maintainer@NetBSD.org, netbsd-bugs@NetBSD.org
Subject: Re: port-xen/29887: sysctl kern.consdev coredumps
Date: Tue, 21 Jun 2005 20:46:47 +0200

 On Tue, Jun 21, 2005 at 01:14:25PM -0500, James Chacon wrote:
 > BTW: -ffreestanding doesn't even imply it's what I would be using for
 > this:
 > 
 >        -ffreestanding
 >            Assert that compilation takes place in a freestanding environment.
 >            This implies -fno-builtin.  A freestanding environment is one in
 >            which the standard library may not exist, and program startup may
 >            not necessarily be at "main".  The most obvious example is an OS
 >            kernel.  This is equivalent to -fno-hosted.
 
 Actually, it does say all the necessary thing.
 
 (a) The standard library may not exist. --> can't depend on the behaviour
 (b) -fno-builtin is the more important part.
 
 If you consider printf a partial builtin like e.g. sqrt under certain
 circumstances, it makes a lot more sense.
 
 Joerg