Re: [Sablevm-developer] Fully automatic configuration (for Linux at least) - first try

[Etienne M. G. <eti...@uq...>]

On Sun, Oct 13, 2002 at 12:46:47AM +0200, Grzegorz Prokopski wrote:
> Hi!
> 
> Below is my patch for having fully automatic configuration on
> Linux (and probably other GNU-based) systems.

Great!  I'm starting to look at it.

> 
> I don't think it's 100% suitable for new release. I'd like to
> hear your comments on this. But IMO it's the right direction.

So, here's what I'll do.  I'll first check in your ia64 patch, make a
release, then start playing with this code, and maybe check it into
CVS if it seems good enough.

> 
> I compiled the version for i386 and it worked.
> Do you have any "cons" why I should _not_ upload such modified
> version to Debian (to let it be tested on autobuilders for all 12
> architectures and so on) ?

I would definitely prefer that the Debian version be based on an
official SableVM release.  I could maintain 2 SableVM branches: stable
and experimental, which could help with experimentations.

> PS: I removed some #if (defined (__GNUC__)) - I am not against
> having such #ifs in future, when we support sth. more than __GNUC__,
> but now - it's only bloat IMHO.

I disagree.  I see no reason for the switch threaded interpreter not
to compile with an arbitrary ANSI/ISO C compiler, and I would like to
keep it so.  We can add "#else #error TODO" if you want, but I
disagree to get rid of "#if (defined (__GNUC__))", as it hilights
non-portable parts of the code.

> I tried to keep the number if #ifs as low as possible. In fact -
> there are some #if (defined __i386__) or __alpha__ that could be
> removed too, but if we'd like to support systems w/o asm/system.h
> in future - it may be good to keep it as it's now. (almost)

There's no reason to "hide" non-portable code by removing such
conditionals.  I have explicitly put these in place to simplify
porting to new systems.

> 	Probably first non-Linux port (besides *BSD family) can
> be MS Windows, so keeping at least i386 and ia64 seems resonable.

I do not know how well MS Windows supports Posix Threads and
libraries, but such a port would effectively be quite interesting.
Beware that I will refer you to the GNU Classpath project for problems
with the native libraries... ;-)

> PSS: My approach with testing this code would be to just to upload
> it to unstable and let the autobuilders do the rest. Then uplaod fixed
> version and so on. After second try we should have all basic problems
> solved. Then I could request testing on different arches at debian-java,
> or maybe better - installation of the packages on all the machines
> by deb...@de....

Let me a first make release with ia64 patch.  Then I'll play with this
new code.  We could experiment with it a for a week or so before making a
new release with this new code (possibly with some fixes).  What do
you think?


Etienne

-- 
Etienne M. Gagnon                    http://www.info.uqam.ca/~egagnon/
SableVM:                                       http://www.sablevm.org/
SableCC:                                       http://www.sablecc.org/