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Re: [RFC] minimum gcc version for kernel: raise to gcc-4.3 or 4.6?

From Russell King - ARM Linux <linux@armlinux.org.uk>
Newsgroups linux.kernel
Subject Re: [RFC] minimum gcc version for kernel: raise to gcc-4.3 or 4.6?
Date 2017-01-02 13:30 +0100
Message-ID <sV9Ut-6L5-13@gated-at.bofh.it> (permalink)
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On Sat, Dec 17, 2016 at 12:29:50PM +0100, Sebastian Andrzej Siewior wrote:
> A new version is understandable. But why is an old version required?
> One thing is an enterprise distro that is "current" or "supported" and still
> stuck with gcc 4.1 because that is the version they decided to include in
> their release. This is sad. But you might want to ask yourself why you want
> the latest kernel but an old gcc / binutils.

To help isolate changes.

If you constantly upgrade everything, how do you bug hunt for a breakage?
How do you know whether it's created by the kernel, or by (eg) a later
version of gcc miscompiling the kernel.  You have a large amount of code
to start bug hunting through.

Sticking with particular tool versions long-term means that you build up
confidence in it - yes, sure, latent bugs exist, but it's easier to
bug hunt if you aren't constantly suspecting that your tools might be
broken.

For example, I build kernels with:

		gcc		binutils		built on
32-bit ARM	4.7.4		2.25			April/May 2015
64-bit ARM	4.9.2		2.25.51.20150219	Feb/April 2015

I'm not anticipating upgrading them for some time yet - the only one
which may get upgraded is the 64-bit binutils since later kernels now
complain about a missing errata workaround in that toolchain version.

I do still have some older toolchains around on some of my ARM boxes
though, even a GCC 3 version with ARM TLS support for faster builds!

-- 
RMK's Patch system: http://www.armlinux.org.uk/developer/patches/
FTTC broadband for 0.8mile line: currently at 9.6Mbps down 400kbps up
according to speedtest.net.

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[RFC] minimum gcc version for kernel: raise to gcc-4.3 or 4.6? Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de> - 2016-12-16 12:10 +0100
  [PATCH 01/13] [HACK] gcc-4.5: avoid  link errors for unused function pointers Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de> - 2016-12-16 12:10 +0100
  Re: [RFC] minimum gcc version for kernel: raise to gcc-4.3 or 4.6? Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de> - 2016-12-16 12:20 +0100
  Re: [RFC] minimum gcc version for kernel: raise to gcc-4.3 or 4.6? Geert Uytterhoeven <geert@linux-m68k.org> - 2016-12-16 17:10 +0100
    Re: [RFC] minimum gcc version for kernel: raise to gcc-4.3 or 4.6? Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de> - 2016-12-16 21:00 +0100
      Re: [RFC] minimum gcc version for kernel: raise to gcc-4.3 or 4.6? Geert Uytterhoeven <geert@linux-m68k.org> - 2016-12-16 21:40 +0100
  Re: [RFC] minimum gcc version for kernel: raise to gcc-4.3 or 4.6? Sebastian Andrzej Siewior <sebastian@breakpoint.cc> - 2016-12-16 18:10 +0100
    Re: [RFC] minimum gcc version for kernel: raise to gcc-4.3 or 4.6? Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de> - 2016-12-16 23:10 +0100
      Re: [RFC] minimum gcc version for kernel: raise to gcc-4.3 or 4.6? Sebastian Andrzej Siewior <sebastian@breakpoint.cc> - 2016-12-17 12:40 +0100
        Re: [RFC] minimum gcc version for kernel: raise to gcc-4.3 or 4.6? Russell King - ARM Linux <linux@armlinux.org.uk> - 2017-01-02 13:30 +0100
      Re: [RFC] minimum gcc version for kernel: raise to gcc-4.3 or 4.6? Heiko Carstens <heiko.carstens@de.ibm.com> - 2016-12-20 11:00 +0100

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