Recently GCC 3.3.3 was released. Slackware is one of the first distros offering it in its unstable branch. Also check the short article “Debugging Tools for C on Linux Platform” at LinuxGazette.com.
GCC 3.3.3 Released
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
Debian had 3.3.3 prereleases in it for a long time, and 3.3.3 final was in as of yesterday..
Can someone help me understand what exactly constantly “changes” in GCC. It seems like they put out a new release every 2-3 months. Are these bug fixes, performance enhancements or what.
There really doesn’t seem to me that a lot needs to change so often in a compiler….
Most of the changes are made because of these key factors:
* Corrections (bugfixes);
* Changes under the skin so that it improves its capabilities to target different architectures (processors) and envinroments (os’s) (the ABI?);
* Adapt to standards and, as you know, standards are a king of moving targets (like universal constants as Dirac predicted years ago)
* gcc had added a lot of ‘improvements’ over standards and must take them off to improve compatibility, but it must be done slowly.
Most of the changes are made because of these key factors:
* Corrections (bugfixes);
* Changes under the skin so that it improves its capabilities to target different architectures (processors) and envinroments (os’s) (the ABI?);
* Adapt to standards and, as you know, standards are a <<<kind>>> of moving targets (like universal constants as Dirac predicted years ago);
* Improve the list of supported languages;
* gcc had added a lot of ‘improvements’ over standards and must take them off to improve compatibility, but it must be done slowly.
FreeBSD 5.2-RELEASE uses it.
uhm, pardon the ignorance but, how do i convert to the slackware unstable brance? is it something like debian unstable where we just change the lines in sources.list? TIA.
The easiest way to do it is by using Swaret: http://www.swaret.org/
Install the swaret slackware package, edit its /etc/swaret.conf file to include kernel upgrades (they are by default OFF and if you don’t turn them on, your sound will stop working because swaret will download the new ALSA packages) and tell it what mirrors to use, and then do as root or via sudo:
swaret –update (this will download the list of the new files)
swaret –upgrade (this will actually download the files and install them)
Read its manual for more options and tricks.
According to http://cvs.archlinux.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/base/gcc/PKGBUILD?cvsro… the gcc 3.3.3 is in ArchLinux Current branch. I think this is the most up-to-date distro.
Go to slackware homepage and browse the code from their ftp site. Look for something like gcc.SlackBuild, change the version and what more could be needed.
An advice: do it only if you really need. You have in your distribution 3 key packages: glibc, gcc and the the kernel itself, and mistakes on building them are not that easy to fix.
Just use swaret –upgrade -a
Check http://www.swaret.org for info on one of the greatest tools ever.
Or dl an unofficial ISO from http://www.slackware.no.
thanks for the replies. i’m a bit hesitant however because i have dropline gnome on my system and it has its own series of dependencies. i’m even hesitant to patch because it might break dropline. is it a bad idea to mix dropline, swaret and slapt-get?
Vince, email me or IM me about this, because it is kinda off topic to talk about it here. I can help you through the updates and let you know about dropline and what not.
But please don’t post more slackware-specific comments here, it is not really on topic.
since there are many other distros that have been using 3.3.3 for some time now. It just makes OSN look biased.
AT LEAST Slackware, Debian, Gentoo and ArchLinux include gcc 3.3.3, so the mention of Slackware doesn’t really belong there…
“one of the first” not the first, chill out people.
I know. I also use FreeBSD 5.2-Release
-bash-2.05b$ gcc -v
Using built-in specs.
Configured with: FreeBSD/i386 system compiler
Thread model: posix
gcc version 3.3.3 [FreeBSD] 20031106
But I rekon that FreeBSD’s gcc in the base system is specifically patched for it’s own use, therefore I guess it is not the same. I am not sure, but that is what I understand.
tell me if I am wrong.
FYI There is gcc 3.4 in the FreeBSD port tree.
It is in ports, not base system
Er, what’s going on with gcc 3.3.3 on http://ftp.gnu.org ? It seems to have been pulled (the first link in this story to ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gcc/gcc-3.3.3/ no longer works), though I can still see at, say, the UK mirror ftp://ftp.mirror.ac.uk/sites/sources.redhat.com/pub/gcc/releases/g…
The bizarre thing is that it appears that most or all of the official gcc mirrors seem to have 3.3.3 – it’s just http://ftp.gnu.org that doesn’t ! Maybe Eugenia might want to adjust or remove the “GCC 3.3.3” link?
Can you please remove that link, since it contains several errors. The author of the article seem to have no clue at all. For example, GDB is _NOT_ the Gnome Debugger, and it’s
called Slackware and not Slacware.
I think that the reference to GDB is incorrectly referenced as being the “Gnome Debugger”, when it is actually “Gnu Debug” (aka gdb). Just want to make sure that credit is given where credit is due. I also wanted to say “Thank you!” to the gcc and gdb development teams!
In regards to ElectricFence, unless I am mistaken, it is (or at least was at one time) included in earlier RedHat releases.
Thanks.
Looking at the timestamp on that GCC it must’ve been pulled from CVS and tagged as 3.3.3 (a lot like the RH GCC 2.96 situation), considering that 3.3.3 final was only released on 2004-02-14.
whats the difference betwen an API and an ABI? It seems that everywhere I look someone is talking about some ABI.
API: Aplication programming interface
ABI: Aplication binary interface
The API are the functions you use to program a system. The ABI is how these functions are named, how they put their arguments in the stack, etc.
FreeBSD 5.2 was released way before GCC 3.3.3
“gcc version 3.3.3 [FreeBSD] 20031106“
This is such a break through!!!!!
I’m going to reinvest my stocks into this!!
Gimme a HELL YEA!!
Peace,
Holmes