Fwd: Arguments for Obj-C++ in GCC 4.0

[Lars Sonchocky-Helldorf]

The most important tool for a Developer is not a fancy IDE but still 
the compiler. "Our" compiler, GCC is in it 4.0 incarnation currently 
not able to compile GNUstep, see:

http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=18408

and more clearly in its Duplicates:

http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=18771 and
http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=19553

maybe even worse is the fact that this bug is *not* considered critical 
and has been taken of the release milestone 4.0.0 by the release 
manager of GCC (see: 
http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=18408#c9, in order to get 
the number of open bugs down and this way GCC ready for a release - 
this tactic reminds me to the way leaders of "people-owned" companies 
in the former East-Germany "over-accomplished" the government 
schedules: make a schedule, see that you won't accomplish it, reduce 
the schedule drastically and then over accomplish that "corrected" 
schedule by a huge amount, praise yourself).

This would be not our problem if GCC would be just "some ObjC compiler" 
(in this case it would be GCCs problem) but GCC is the only freely 
available Compiler that is capable of compiling GNUstep.

What do I want from you now? See, if I am the only one that is active 
in some way (although I lack the insight into GCCs code and I think 
compilers are no easy bussiness) writing mails, pinging patches, trying 
to advocate and so on people possibly think: "what a crazy guy yelling 
around here" and consider me a troller or worse. If more people would 
speak up we could maybe (just by the amount of us) convince the GCC 
maintainers that Objective-C/Objective-C++ is *not just* a strange 
language for strange people (like me ;-)) but something that is 
actually used and needed.

So please get involved into GCC development (even if it is just 
submitting bug reports, testing the Objective-C part of GCC 
meticulously or requesting features on gcc@gcc.gnu.org (*politely* 
please! I am talking to you, Mr BIOS ;-))


This is what happens else:

Anfang der weitergeleiteten E-Mail:

> Von: Joe Buck <Joe.Buck@synopsys.COM>
> Datum: Sa, 22. Jan 2005  02:18:03 Europe/Berlin
> An: Lars Sonchocky-Helldorf <lars.sonchocky-helldorf@hamburg.de>
> Cc: Laski Ziemowit <zlaski@apple.com>, gcc@gcc.gnu.org
> Betreff: Re: Arguments for Obj-C++ in GCC 4.0
>
> On Sat, Jan 22, 2005 at 12:20:23AM +0100, Lars Sonchocky-Helldorf 
> wrote:
> > here are some arguments if you need them to get obj-c++ out of the 
> > door
> > for 4.0
>
> "A bunch of people on IRC are unhappy" is not an argument.  The code is
> ready when it's ready.
>
> The issues raised by Geoff Keating were not "bureaucracy", they were
> technical, and they were resolved; the final resolution was
>
> http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc-patches/2004-12/msg00433.html
>
> This was an important issue because the wrong design would have slowed
> down the C and C++ compilers more.  As it is, all C and C++ users will 
> pay
> a slight penalty due to the support of ObjC++, but a threshold (no more
> than 1% cost) was agreed to and was met.
>
> Many of the comments in the IRC log you quote seem misinformed or out 
> of
> date.

regards, Lars