On Sat, Mar 15, 2003 at 10:28:36AM -0500, James K. Lowden wrote:

 > That's the crux.  If NetBSD's sources rely on gcc-only features, we have
 > to use gcc to build NetBSD.  If OTOH NetBSD's sources were strictly ANSI
 > compliant, we'd have our pick of compilers.  

If we were to use a strictly ANSI compiler, we'd have to write a lot more
things in assembly language, or sacrifice run-time performance.  Most of
the GCC features we rely on are the ones related to extended asm() statements,
inlining, and the non-ANSI built-ins it provides (e.g. __builtin_ffs()).

 > Given NetBSD philosophy of portability uber alles, I'm surprised we'd
 > restrict ourselves to the output of a single compiler, or even a single
 > compiler collection.  

There's also a bit of "pick your battles" going on.  The GNU compiler
collection is a pretty good compiler, and it is actively maintained by
a large group of talented developers.  They also maintain the C++ anf
Fortran run-times that we use.  The NetBSD Project just does not have
the manpower to duplicate that effort.

-- 
        -- Jason R. Thorpe <thorpej@wasabisystems.com>