[cobalt-users] RaQ2: building gcc

["Dylan Smith" <dyls@xxxxxxx>]

All,

I asked a couple of weeks ago about building gcc 2.95.2 on a RaQ2 (I needed
to install tcl/tk, (and a friend needed to install a web application written
in C++ which is not supported well by gcc2.7), and gcc 2.7 segfaults whilst
building tcl).
Nobody replied, but we have had success, and in case anyone needs a newer
gcc for a RaQ2, I'd like to say we have one now.
Needless to say, Sun were about as useful as a chocolate fireguard when I
asked them about it via the official Cobalt support route. But never mind
that.

Here's what we found out whilst building it:
* Apparently 2.95.2 will not build on mips/linux at all unless you do some
unspecified tweaking to some of the header files.
* My friend Serguei Narojnyi instead tried for gcc 2.97 (a CVS snapshot,
erk!) and he had the patience required to build it. It took 3 goes in the
end. All the credit must go to him ;-) The compiler seems to work fine.

The problems he encountered whilst building it were:
- on a couple of the files there is a function >100K in size! Relative jumps
on a Mips cannot be bigger than 16 bits, so 'as' died whilst trying to build
the result. Compiling those two files with -O2 brought the size down enough
so they would build.
- javalib seems to be in the gcc core now, which sucks if you haven't built
and don't want to build gjc, but this may just be because it's a CVS
snapshot. I hope ;-)

gcc 2.97 does seem to work just fine though - I could build tcl/tk with it
and it didn't segfault.

If anyone needs gcc > 2.7 on a RaQ2, drop me an email. I'm in the process of
making a monster tarball of the results. Don't expect an rpm!

--
Dylan Smith, Houston TX.
Flying: http://www.dylansmith.net
FFE/FE2 Universe: http://www.alioth.net
"Asking a girl out is like finding sqrt(pi) using roman numerals."