Re: Bountysource campaign for gcc-vax

[Martin Husemann <martin%duskware.de@localhost>]

On Sun, May 02, 2021 at 01:52:09PM +0200, Johnny Billquist wrote:
> I'd be very interested in trying.
> 
> However, I have never tried getting a different version of gcc setup for a
> build.
> I do have a different NetBSD system on which I do cross-build for VAX, since
> it hasn't worked to do a native build in something like 10 years (maybe 15,
> I can't even remember anymore).
> 
> But I would then need to setup that system to do a cross-build for VAX, with
> that cross build containing the new gcc. How do I do that.

Slightly tricky. Usualy I would suggest a native build of the new gcc
on the VAX, but as we know this will not work.

One option is to build a cross toolchain via the standard gcc procedure
on the build machine, targetting VAX. Then copy over all created binaries
(e.g. to /usr/local/) and play with them manually to verify they work for
simple programs. When that works, set CC (and maybe AS, LD, ...) in the
environment and build a kernel (this still works the old way, with config
and make, you may have to additionally set USE_TOOLS=never).

When that kernel works, try a full build with the CC/LD/AS env vars.

An alternative is what we would do for a newly imported gcc (modulo the
first two lines):

 - cd src/external/gpl3/gcc && rm -rf dist
 - recreate dist with the content from the official gcc release
 - follow the instructions in src/tools/gcc/README.mknative

If you don't need other updates (e.g. mpfr or gmp) this could work relatively
painless - but it could also be quite a bit of work.

Martin