Subject: Re: vtable format
To: None <port-alpha@netbsd.org>
From: Miles Nordin <carton@Ivy.NET>
List: port-alpha
Date: 08/12/2004 14:26:13
>>>>> "st" == Shin'ichiro TAYA <taya@NetBSD.org> writes:

    st> (3)Is this NetBSD specific change or gcc specific?

You have run into a long-standing Mozilla bug:

 http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=71627

  Summary: probably don't run using gcc-3.0 on non x86 platforms

  Assigned To: Nobody's working on this, feel free to take it
               <nobody@mozilla.org>

  Created: 2001-03-11 by David Baron working on bug#63604, which was
           their gcc 3.x porting effort.

I guess when mozilla.org started working on gcc 3.x compatibility,
they shoved support for non-i386 off to a different bug number with no
maintainer, and ignored it.  Consequently, mozilla doesn't work on
most non-i386 with gcc 3.x, and there's been no significant work on
the problem in _over three years_.

bug 63604 mentions how to go forward, but like I said they abandoned
work and hid the fact by filing this other bug.

 There is a debugging tool: TextXPTCInvoke
   tells if you have the .s stuff right or not, rather than just
   building the whole program and seeing if it core-dumps.

 There is a documentation page:
   http://www.mozilla.org/scriptable/xptcall-faq.html
   tells how to port Mozilla to new C++ ABIs

 There is a page about the gcc 3.x ABI:
   http://reality.sgi.com/dehnert_engr/cxx/cxx-summary.html
   ``has information on the ia64 C++ ABI, which is also
   (cross-platform) the G++ V3 ABI.''

When I looked at this last, for macppc, I found a few scattered
patches in Debian and Gentoo's local package collections.  AFAICT
nothing is checked into mozilla.org's CVS, but I haven't actually
checked out their sources---I'm just going by the abandoned state of
the bug report and the local changes in Linux packages.

NetBSD 2.0 will probably ship with no working mozilla on all ports
except i386.  might be a good idea to round up binary packages for
NetBSD 1.6 mozilla/firefox and test them.  That's what I'm doing on
macppc now---depending on binary compatibility until mozilla.org
resumes work on this bug.  I tried working on it myself and got the
symbols to resolve, but it crashed when run.  too bad since we can't
show off our new threads.

-- 
Le fascisme est la dictature ouverte de la bourgeoisie.
		-- Georg Dimitrov