KDE blacklist of Fedora Core's gcc 4

[Steven P. Ulrick]

On Tue, 14 Jun 2005 15:24:12 +0530
Rahul Sundaram <sundaram at redhat.com> wrote:

> Hi
> 
> >Hello, Rahul :)
> >I hate to bother you more than you can imagine, but can I assume that
> >the code that I need to remove is in the "configure" file that is in
> >the root of each KDE module?  If it is, then how can I get changes
> >that I make to stick, since running "unsermake -f Makefile.cvs" will
> >overwrite the "configure" script.
> >Of course, I may be wrong about where this version check is located.
> >Please feel free to correct me if necessary.  But I must also
> >confess, that I can't find exactly what I need to find.  I've tried
> >a few things, with no success.
> >  
> >
> Well I havent had the oppurtunity to try compiling a large beast like 
> KDE from SVN myself but the cvs commits list
> 
> http://lists.kde.org/?l=kde-commits&m=111451142117674&w=2 shows that
> the configuration file is "kde-common/admin/acinclude.m4.in". grep
> can be a handy tool here
> 
> >I must interpret that to mean that as soon as they find out the
> >Fedora Core's gcc 4 is fixed, that they will remove the blacklist.
> >  
> >
> Try compiling it. If it does work successfully report specifically to 
> bugs.kde.org  that the Fedora version doesnt have this issue.
> Providing the following link is a good idea to help them pull out the
> necessary patches if its hasnt been pushed upstream yet
> 
> http://cvs.fedora.redhat.com/
> 
> regards
> Rahul

Hello, Everyone
For no other purpose than to help clarify at least one KDE person's
judgement on FC's version of gcc 4, check out the following portions of
three emails that I just got from a KDE developer.  In the interest of
objectivity, I will quote the final line of this first qutation: "[This
email should be considered my personal feelings on gcc 4,
nothing more, nothing less]"  The point being, he is not being
unreasonably dogmatic about this:

> So what if they apparently fixed that issue. A C++ compiler is a
> complex beast. How many (hundreds maybe) more bugs exist in gcc 4
> that have not yet been identified?
> 
> I've already wasted a large amount of time closing false bug reports
> (crashes and compile errors) resulting from Red Hat previously
> shipping an experimental CVS branch of gcc and calling it 2.96 and I
> would not particularly want to deal with that again. I might send
> them an invoice for wasting my time.
> 
> [This email should be considered my personal feelings on gcc 4,
> nothing more, nothing less]



> Well, I think you need to take this up on a Fedora mailing list since
> it's really nothing to do with KDE and KDE development. Downgrading
> to gcc3 may be impossible (or very hard -- you'd have to recompile
> all C++ apps and libs) if their gcc4 has an incompatible C++ ABI.



> On Tuesday 14 June 2005 12:53, Steven P. Ulrick wrote:
> > Yeah, I'm just going back to FC3.  I also have a hard time where I
> > work when everybody is convinced that all error is on the other
> > side.
> >
> > Also, how am I supposed to know that all the fault is on their
> > side, if both sides claim total innocence?  Therefore, I do not
> > feel terribly
> 
> Well, gcc 4 was known to cause problems which is why it's not
> supported by KDE. That's a simple fact, no "innocence" about it. If
> you're an open source software developer with limited time the last
> thing you want to do is spend hours debugging a bizarre bug only to
> find out it's a compiler problem.
> 
> > guilty about bringing this to the "wrong" list.
> 
> It was just a suggestion that you may find people more knowledgable
> on Fedora on a Fedora mailing list, not kde-devel :)

In closing, until for whatever reason KDE's blacklist of FC's gcc 4 is
lifted, I will be going back to FC3.  I have no desire to give up
Fedora Core or KDE from SVN TRUNK.  Also, just having gave it a shot
again this morning, I find GNOME to be unusable for me.  Maybe some of
my complaints are fixable by config files, but to clarify, this is
MERELY my Opinion.

Have a Great Day,
Steven P. Ulrick