Re: [RFC] minimum gcc version for kernel: raise to gcc-4.3 or 4.6?
From: Russell King - ARM Linux <linux@armlinux.org.uk>
Date: 2017-01-02 12:24:00
Also in:
kvmarm, linux-kbuild, lkml
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.