Open Watcom 1.2 Released

An anonymous reader writes "Open Watcom 1.2 has been released and is now available for download from the Open Watcom website. This release contains a large number of new features, product enhancements and several fixs designed to bring Open Watcom to a higher level of quality and compatibility. SciTech software Inc, the official maintainers of the Open Watcom project, have also announced the availability of an updated Open Watcom CD, complete with SciTechs installer for DOS, OS/2, and windows. Support for the update will be handled exclusively through the Open Watcom website. Read More." According to the web site, "the Watcom C/C++ and Fortran products will be the first mass market, proprietary compilers to be Open Sourced."

Comments

Is it worth it?

[Sklivvz]

This tool compiles for various Win32/16 flavors plus dos and os/2. It doesn't do Linux or PPC/PalmOS... that are the two platforms where you really wanna cross compile!
Do you people think it's a worthwhile product? Has it retained the value it used to have back in the day when most DOS games were compiled using Watcom?

Re:Is it worth it?

[wolf-]

I've been using it since the first release.
I use it because it builds nice fast executables.
For log processing utilities you want to be able to run on any ms os, it works great.

Re:Is it worth it?

[Tagren]

They are working on an Linux version:

http://www.openwatcom.org/about/info_content.htm l

" Since then the developer community has been working hard to get the next release of Open Watcom prepared, including ports to Linux, FreeBSD and the inclusion of the STLPort package."

One could say what is the point of starting the fsf/gcc project. It dont run on anything other than what the devs started on... At the time they started working on it I mean.. not now :=).
---

Re:Is it worth it?

[zozie]

OpenWatcom is there for Linux too, you just need to compile it from source code.

It's already 100% functional as a cross-compiler
(from Linux too DOS/Windows/OS/2 but still not there yet as a native compiler: it has to use it's own libc and cannot output ELF objects (only ELF executables). The debugger works too, but
symbolic debugging only works with OW compiled
executables.

That means it's fine for statically linked plain ANSI C executables on Linux but does not integrate very well with the GNU toolchain, X libraries, ....

Re:Is it worth it?

[j-pimp]

They are working on an Linux version:
Which is coming along quite nicely. I believe it even can compile itself on linux.

Ahhh, the old days

[JMZero]

I would have paid good money for a free Watcom back in about 1992. Well, unless it was free that is, then I would have kept my money. Watcom was big news back then, and seemed to have all the features my Borland C++ 3 lacked.

Is this still a useful product for people? Is the Windows support going to be good enough that it will supplant any of the other development options a Windows user has?

Most importantly, does it support Expanded and Extended memory?

Re:Ahhh, the old days

[pwroberts]

> Most importantly, does it support Expanded and Extended memory?

I *believe* it comes with a free DOS extender, so yes. It certainly has support for several (once-)common ones.

--
Paul

Re:Ahhh, the old days

[pwroberts]

>> Most importantly, does it support Expanded and Extended memory?
> I *believe* it comes with a free DOS extender, so yes. It certainly has support for several (once-)common ones.

From the Open Watcom site:

"Free DOS extenders included!
Open Watcom C/C++ and FORTRAN includes a number of royalty free and Open Source DOS extenders right out of the box. Thanks to Tenberry Software's gracious donation, the original DOS/4GW DOS extender from Watcom C/C++ and FORTRAN is included royalty free with the Open Watcom compilers. Also included is the now free CauseWay DOS extender developed by Michael Devore. Both binaries are included as well as complete source code in the source archives. Finally we have also included the free PMODE/W and DOS/32A DOS extenders as part of the package."

--
Paul

Re:Ahhh, the old days

[chthon]

I did pay for the Watcom 32-bit compiler for DOS, Windows and OS/2, back then. Never used it very much though, the main reason for using it was learning the OS/2 Presentation Manager API, but I never got really far.

Before I got enough hardware to run Linux, I bought several compilers, two versions of Zortech C++, and after that the Watcom compiler, because Symantec did not support OS/2 anymore.

And now I only use scripting languages with Tk.

Jurgen

Why does this get put on the frontpage,

[sinergy]

yet there is no explanation as to what the product is? Do editors assume everyone is aware of what this program is?

Re:Why does this get put on the frontpage,

[Sklivvz]

It is a C/C++ compiler, the most used for games/multimedia until the advent of directX in the mid-90s.

Re:Why does this get put on the frontpage,

[vasqzr]

The Watcom compiler was a very popular DOS C/C++ compiler. Combined with DOS4GW from Tenberry (formerly Rational Systems), it was used to create many DOS games such as Doom. Traditional DOS compilers were only 16-bit tools whereas Watcom was 32-bit

SciTech scooped up Watcom's goods. They're also behind MGL, wxWindows, SNAP for Linux, Display Doctor, and GLDirect.

Re:Why does this get put on the frontpage,

[sinergy]

I already know what it is. I was not asking for an explanation of it here. I was wondering why that explanation isn't in the writeup.

Re:Why does this get put on the frontpage,

[aled]

Do editors assume everyone is aware of what this program is?

Yes of course. We all are "in" and know all the terminology and all the acronyms and abbreviations that we create just that anyone outside people -call them losers- doesn't understand us. And we know every obscure little app for linux that only can be compiled from cvs sources -from a cvs server know only by ip by us- after you create your own build system. In fact we don't even need to say what program are we talking about. And we know every ./ (you know what ./ means right?) user by id. After all this is a small club. You should known all this. Unless you should not be here. And me neither...

Re:Why does this get put on the frontpage,

[some guy I know]

And we know every ./ (you know what ./ means right?) user by id.

Two possible responses:

• Dot-slash?
  Are you sure that you don't have it backwards?
• I think that it means the current directory.
  I don't know what a current directory user id is, though.

Anyone else?

Re:Why does this get put on the frontpage,

[Anonymous Coward]

The "DOS" Screenshot on their wxwindows page looks awfully like a windows screenshot...

Re:Why does this get put on the frontpage,

[aled]

Oh, you are not "in" else you would know. In fact I also never make an orthographic error, I obfuscate the meaning to confuse the peasants.

Re:Why does this get put on the frontpage,

[Tassach]

If you don't know what OpenWatcom is, then it's likely you don't care about it. Of course if you had the reading comprehension skills of a trained chimpanzee, you could tell from context that it's some kind of compiler. The sentence "the Watcom C/C++ and Fortran products will be the first mass market, proprietary compilers to be Open Sourced" kind of gives it away. If you still had questions you could have actually CLICKED ON THE FREAKING LINK and looked at the project web site, instead of whining that you aren't being spoon fed information.

Re:Why does this get put on the frontpage,

[Anonymous Coward]

They didn't invent wxWindows, they just use it and sponsered a port to thier MGL system

Re:Why does this get put on the frontpage,

[aled]

What if I DO know what OpenWatcom is but I didn't get the chimp training? Where I work you are supposed to be already trained and they don't wanna pay for it.

Why would someone use Watcom rather than GCC?

[Futurepower(R)]

Why would someone use Watcom rather than GCC?

I understand that the Fortran compiler may be better than free alternatives.

Re:Why would someone use Watcom rather than GCC?

[Anonymous Coward]

because gcc sucks?

Re:Why would someone use Watcom rather than GCC?

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe you've got a ton of old code that only runs on OS/2/DOS and wouldn't compile cleanly under GCC?

Re:Why would someone use Watcom rather than GCC?

[91degrees]

Because they're already familar with Watcom?

Because they like an IDE?

Because Watcom has better support for Windows .libs and dlls?

I think the main reason though, is "Why not?". Why use GCC instead of Watcom? There's no overriding reason not to use Watcom. A lot of people have been using it for a while. Why switch?

Re:Why would someone use Watcom rather than GCC?

[BigFootApe]

I understand that the Fortran compiler may be better than free alternatives.

Yes and no. WatFor77 was/is indeed very good, but it's a little dated.

The future is G95.

Re:Why would someone use Watcom rather than GCC?

[Anonymous Coward]

the future is also HURD. What if I need a fortran compiler today?

Re:Why would someone use Watcom rather than GCC?

[zozie]

Compared to current gcc's it's
* a very fast compiler (compile-time speed)
* that produces very compact code (in terms of size)
* so the generated code *may* even be faster than gcc's (if a loop just fits in the cache), despite the fact that gcc has quite a few more years of optimization improvements now.
* it also feels more native on non-UNIX platforms
(whatever that means ... gcc on Windows has a ported feel, some people don't like that, some others don't mind or like it)
* can generate 16-bit code, useful for bootloaders (and FreeDOS :)
* even supports "far" (48-bit) pointers in protected mode
* all in all very good for embedded and driver work IMHO

on the other hand GCC is much better now in terms of standard compliance (in particularly C++); OW is slowly catching up a bit, has a more extensive warning system, supports SSE(2), custom Athlon and p4 optimizations, profile guided optimization, supports many other CPUs,
etc etc.

Re:Why would someone use Watcom rather than GCC?

[j-pimp]

Because Watcom has better support for Windows .libs and dlls?
As a large fan of Watcom, Regular user of it, and poster on the watcom newsgroups, I must say that GCC has superior support for windows DLLs. Now Watcom has its own eccentricities for using DLLs, such as the command line NOSTDCALL to strip the _ and @N from stdcall exported stdcall functions. However, gcc's dlltool lets you do all sorts of fun things, and GCC lets you you specify a DLL on on the command line instead of an import lib to resolve external dependencies.

Why do I use watcom?
Because its weird, wmake called the rest of the toolchain as DLLs, and I'm fustrated by the amount of voodoo neccessary to compile GCC as a cross compiler.

Re:Why would someone use Watcom rather than GCC?

[James Youngman]

I understand that the Fortran compiler may be better than free alternatives.

The Watcom FORTRAN compiler (which I used in 1990) has an auspicious ancestor, the WATFIV compiler from the University of Waterloo. They have a history page for it there.

Re:Why would someone use Watcom rather than GCC?

[BigFootApe]

Pay kabong and buy one. Or live with FORTRAN 77. Or use F. I think Intel might even have freebies if your educational.

There's lots of choices.

Re:Why would someone use Watcom rather than GCC?

[Anonymous Coward]

Watcom has its own eccentricities for using DLLs, such as the command line NOSTDCALL to strip the _ and @N from stdcall exported stdcall functions

You could also use the Windows standard EXPORT-directive-in-a-DEF-file mechanism. Anything else is an eccentricity, regardless of what compiler it is.

GCC lets you you specify a DLL on on the command line instead of an import lib to resolve external dependencies

Uhm, wlink IMPORT func module.

But is it usable?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm very interested in finding out if the user interface isn't still a complete joke. Usability was never Watcom's strong point... actually, usability was always the very *worst* aspect of the compiler. It made Microsoft Visual Studio a dream in comparison, probably why it lost the compiler wars despite having a reputation of good performance for the things it compiled.

Anyone know if it's been improved for this release?

Re:But is it usable?

[Brandybuck]

It's a freaking compiler! It doesn't have to be user friendly!

If you want to use an IDE, go use and IDE. No one is stopping you. I have nothing against them. But a compiler is not and should be an IDE.

Re:But is it usable?

[91degrees]

Watcom is an IDE. It contains a compiler, but it also contains everything else you might want.

Re:But is it usable?

[91degrees]

Lots of people seem to agree with you, but for some reason, I've never worked out what it is that it doesn't do. Personally, I'm quite fond of it. The main reason for this is I'm a screen space miser, and It's one of the few IDEs that comes with a full screen editor.

Re:But is it usable?

[aled]

An editor that doesn't hang up when pasting from other programs?
may be they fixed that after 10.6

Re:But is it usable?

[edwdig]

Watcom didn't really lose the compiler wars, it simply dropped out. Sybase bought Watcom years ago because they wanted Watcom SQL. They immediately stopped development of the Watcom compiler.

Re:But is it usable?

[j-pimp]

Watcom includes clones of CL.exe, NMAKE and LINK that allow you to put the watcom bin/include/lib folders at the head of the VC++ search path and use the Visual C++ ide to compile with watcom. Unfortunatly their a bit dated, but work fine with visual studio 5.0. They have begun to support newer flags and a maintainer that cares about such thing would probally be welcomed by the maintainers and community as a whole.

Re:But is it usable?

[mobiGeek]

Sybase bought Watcom years ago because they wanted Watcom SQL

Actually, Sybase acquired Powersoft in 1995 for its application development tools (e.g. PowerBuilder). Powersoft had acquired Watcom in 1994 specifically to add an RDBMS to their product line.

There were industry rumours of Sybase dropping SQL Anywhere (formerly Watcom SQL, now Adaptive Server Anywhere) early on after the 1995 acquisition, but nothing beyond apparently.

The ASA engineering group (Waterloo Ontario) and ASE group (Dublin California) have worked together on joint projects, but the two products remain independently architected and developed. The main joint task forces seem to work(ed) on adding T-SQLisms to ASA and on the IQ product.

Re:But is it usable?

[91degrees]

True. It wa annoying. That was fixed by version 11.0.

Re:But is it usable?

[JediTrainer]

That reminds me. In high school we were working on a project, but ran into that issue.

Watcom 10's tools had sucky UI (but awesome compiler with DOS4GW - a godsend). Borland (Turbo C++?) had a crappy compiler (but awesome UI).

Solution? Link Borland's IDE to Watcom's tools. Worked like a charm.

Back in the day....

[teambpsi]

This was THE compiler to use with RTLINK/plus to build protected mode video games -- okay, protected mode anything

and the only reason we used protected mode?

BIG RAM BABY

thanks to the (in)famous 640k 'barrier'

though to some extent i'm not sure how relevant the toolset is today....

DB?

[baldass_newbie]

Any chance of the DB going Open Source? Or is Sybase holding that too close?
I think that would be a great tool to have in Windows. Give MySQL a run for its money and could kill Access on the desktop.

Re:DB?

[hey!]

Any chance of the DB going Open Source? Or is Sybase holding that too close?

There's zero chance.

RDBMS is the core business at Sybase. They'd have to completely redefine the company and its businss model. Watcom C++ is something they ended up with by pure accident, and were wise to unload.

Watcom was acquired by PowerBuilder as part of the deal which got them Sql Anywhere (pretty much comparable and competitive with Interbase that begat Firebird). PowerBuilder needed a fairly robust database for the same reason Borland coupled Interbase with Delphi. PowerBuilder at one point threw Watcom SQL into some of their PowerBuilder configurations, and may have used parts of it in their native code generation. However, it wasn't really very key to their product strategy, it's just something they got with SQL Anywhere.

Sybase, during one of its more feckless management period, puchased PowerBuilder. I don't know why, probably so they'd have a RAD platform to compete with Oracles forms products. In the process the obtained SQL Anywhere (nee Watcom SQL) and Watcom C++.

SQL Anywhere was a secondary acquisition they got with PowerBuilder, but it actually (in some twisted way) made sense, since its low footprint allowed it to be deployed on mobile devices, giving Sybase a "small" database engine to compete with Oracle's "Personal" database, the way Adaptive Server Enterprise competes with Oracle's flagship database. They rechristened it Adaptive Server Anywhere (although they may have re-rechristened it yet again, since they seem to be very schizo about what they call this product). They also spun off a separate company to promote ASA in mobile apps.

Watcom C++ was not only not a primary consideration in the PowerBuilder acquisition, it wasn't even secondary. It doesn't fit in with what Sybase does, even in a wild flight of imagination. Furthermore, by that time even they had no illusions that they might compete with Microsoft in Win32 compilers.

So, in a rare fit of enlightenment, they opened the source rather than abandoning the users. One of the few product management decisions they've made that I agree with. It makes perfect, selfish sense: there's no value in maintaining the product, but they don't want to alienate customers. So just pass the buck to somebody who wants to maintain it, provide a little engineering help to extricate pieces with license problems, and write the expense off as PR.

Re:DB?

[larry bagina]

your logic makes perfect sense. Unfortunately, this is slashdot. They should open source their DB and make money by selling support contracts.

Re:DB?

[mobiGeek]

Which RDBMS do you mean:

Adaptive Server Enterprise

Adaptive Server Anywhere (formerly Watcom SQL)

IQ

Ah....MySQL and Access, you must be talking about ASA. I suspect it unlikely that ASA become open source in the foreseeable future as it is one of the key products of iAnywhere.

ASA is a much more feature rich and powerful replacement for both above mentioned database-like repositories ;-).

For those who don't know, ASA runs on a multitude of platforms (Palm, CE, Linux, Solaris, AIX, HPUX, OS X, and that MS-Windows thingy). It has very mature synchronization and replication technologies. [Note: I may be somewhat biased on the subject ;-)].

Re:DB?

[Tassach]

Life would indeed be sweet if Sybase were to open the source for their free (as in beer) release of Adaptive Server 11.0.3.3 for Linux. 11.0 is a little long in the tooth in terms of features, but it's still FAR more mature than an inexplicably popular crappy toy database.

Re:DB?

[Tassach]

WTF? Slashcode ate my link. Download page for ASE 11.0.3.3

Re:DB?

[Tassach]

If I had mod points, I'd give you +1 informative.

Sybase also offers free (as in beer) releases of older versions of Adaptive Server Enterprise. ASE 11.9.2 is $0 for development use only, and ASE 11.0.3.3 is $0 for development or production. Since 11.9.2 is now end-of-lifed, you can't purchase a license even if you wanted to. This makes it's usability on production systems somewhat ambiguous.

There are also developer versions available as free downloads (registration required) for ASE 12.5.1 and ASA 9.0 on all supported platforms.

Thinking about that old stuff...

[JMZero]

...really puts in perspective the rate of change in computers. It's been a long time since I thought about what I was going to use extended memory for, or strategies for getting a block right on a 64K line (for use in DMA) without wasting space. I suppose in a few years, it will sound just as hokey to be thinking about how you were going to connect to a database.

I didn't know anyone on the BBS's that had Watcom (or knew much about it beyond its memory setup), but most of us wanted it (everyone noticed it in the Doom load screens). Perhaps having it available will usher in a new wave of retro programming from my generation.

Well, there's always GCC ...

[Chromodromic]

... if you're a code masochist.

Maybe I'm going out on a limb here, maybe I'll be the lonely voice in the wilderness, but for general purposes outside of a learning tool, I can't stand GCC. Why? There are so many reasons, I just don't know where to start.

I hesitate a little to say this because everyone seems to speak so highly of it, at least everyone that I've ever heard. But I'm sorry, the Emperor has no clothes. Whenever I start a compile on GCC I can go downstairs, have dinner, watch an episode of the Simpsons and come upstairs to check on its progress, where the same compile on Borland (yes, I know, it's PROPRIETARY), or for that matter MSVC will have been done for quite some time. And with fewer complaints, moans and bitches from the compiler. And yes, I know full well that those moans and bitches are important, yadda, yadda, and maybe if I watched my warnings and cleaned my code, yadda, yadda, but call me crazy, call me wacky, I just like it when a compiler does its job and shuts up, unless it really has something important to say.

Watcom is great, open, cross-platform, and cool. Do yourself a favor and use it. Just do it -- no! NO! Zip! Zip it! Shut! Zip! Zippity zip!

Re:Well, there's always GCC ...

[Chromodromic]

Cool! I got modded down AND insulted for speaking the truth.

Now I KNOW I'm on the right track. The Emperor really IS naked. What I didn't understand as completely as I do know is that you sourcies *like* him that way. Well, that's typical.

Re:Well, there's always GCC ...

[larry bagina]

it's unfortunate that valid criticism gets censored. Pretending gcc shits diamonds won't make it so.

Fact is, gcc uses more memory -- a LOT more memory -- than most other compilers, especially when optimizing. That makes it much more likely that you'll have to hit the swap file, which of course, kills your speed.

Another problem is GNU make, while more flexible and powerful than the make systems for borland, msvc, etc, is also much slower. If you use something like jam instead, you'll see build times drop significantly.

Re:Well, there's always GCC ...

[91degrees]

Shhh... Don't say nasty things about open source software. Please repeat this Mantra, "Linux is the perfect OS. Open source software never has any bugs". Or just go for the old "Open source, closed minds. We are Slashdot"

Re:Well, there's always GCC ...

[Old Wolf]

Can we ask: why?

GCC is one of the flagship products of the free software movement, but it seems to be clunkier and bloatier and less conforming than just about every commercial C++ compiler. How does the mantra 'open source is better' stand up to this?

Thanks.

[Futurepower(R)]

MOD PARENT UP. Thanks for the complete answer.

Not really "open" source

[some guy I know]

Unfortunately, the site has some really annoying webcode that prevents me from downloading it.
I'd have to either enable JavaScript, which I refuse to do, or spend 15-20 minutes decoding the JavaScript and making my own fake responses, which I also refuse to do.
Does anyone have any mirrors?

Re:Not really "open" source

[Anonymous Coward]

Why not switch to a decent web browser? One that lets you enable JavaScript on a site-by-site basis, so you can turn it on for Watcom and other trusted sites, and keep it off for browsing pr0n and places you've never been before?

Re:Not really "open" source

[Anonymous Coward]

It is opensource, plus their new license will make it free software too.

Try ftp://ftp.openwatcom.com/

Re:Not really "open" source

[some guy I know]

Try ftp://ftp.openwatcom.com/

Thanks for the pointer.
I am downloading the source now.

It is open source.

[anti-NAT]

Isn't javascript open source ? I mean, you download the javascript source to run it. Why do you distrust javascript so much, when it is open ? You can review the code to determine what it is doing, and, if you are happy, enable it temporarily just for that web site.

Sheesh.

[Futurepower(R)]

Some dorky moderator modded me down, after everyone else took my advice and modded the parent up.

windows is "shared source"

[SHEENmaster]

It's possible to view the source, but it's not worth the trouble.

I shouldn't have to run a script to get a file. It's like a mail-order company demanding that a salesman visit your home to place the order, rather than accepting it through mail from you.

That said, it's better than Microsoft's equivalent in which you must give them the keys to your house and let them joyride your car before you can get software. Controlling a communist empire will get you the source code.

Re:windows is "shared source"

[anti-NAT]

It's possible to view the source, but it's not worth the trouble.

That's the trade off you have to decide upon. If you don't want to download it using the originator's methods, fair enough.

That being said, I would consider asking somebody else to download and mirror it for you, presumably at their costs, ie. free to you, to be pretty selfish. You are asking somebody else to do something which you are not prepared to do yourself. You are asking them to take the "security risk" of this javascript code, to avoid taking it yourself.

More broadly, if you don't trust javascript that you can view and audit if you choose too, how can you trust the web browser you use, the operating system you use, and even the hardware you use ? I'm guessing you didn't write every line of code in your browser or OS, or design the chips in your hardware, so how do you know they are doing what you think they are doing. So you are already implicitly trusting somebody else, very likely somebody you'll never meet, nor will be able to confirm absolutely that their intentions were honest and genuine when developing the browser, OS or hardware.

I'm just surprised you appear to distrust javascript so much, when there are so many other areas where trust may be far more commonly misplaced, and where the consequences of misplaced trust are far greater.

Re:windows is "shared source"

[some guy I know]

Your post is right on the money.

I actually did spend a few minutes looking at the JS source to try to figure out what it does, so that I could "emulate" what it was doing manually.
It looks to me like they have deliberately made an effort (albeit a small effort) to make it diffucult for people to do this.
This leads me not to trust them enough to enable JS for their site.
(I probably could have done it after 10-30 minutes, depending, but I got annoyed first.
There may have also been problems because I also block cookies and the "referer" field, but I didn't get that far.)

OTOH, they have made their code available, just difficult to get for us paranoids.
Thanks to information from an anonymous poster, though, I am now downloading the source for their compiler.

So kudos to them for making their code OS, but less praise for the way that they are doing it.

Re:windows is "shared source"

[some guy I know]

When a website uses obfuscated JavaScript to do something that can easily be done with straight HTML, my tinfoil hat starts glowing.

There are different levels of trust.
The main problem with JavaScript is that it is used by all sorts of people/sites for all sorts of nefarious purposes.
I know that this is guilt-by-association, but I am very paranoid in some areas, and this is one of them.
This is why I am downloading the source code instead of their convenient executables, so that I can look through it to see if there are any obvious things like a "phone home" module, etc.
(Hopefully, their source will compile with gcc.)
Had they not used this JavaScript nonsense on their website, I may have trusted them enough to just download and install the binary.
However, the very act of using JavaScript, where it is not necessary, makes me suspicious.
That's just the kind of guy I am.

Also, what I meant by asking about mirrors was whether anyone knew about existing mirrors, not would somebody make a mirror for me.
(I wouldn't download from such a mirror anyway (my paranoia again).)
I can see that the way I asked the question could cause it to be interpreted the way that you did, but that was not what I meant.
It turns out that someone did point me to an existing mirror (or maybe that's where the JavaScript takes you; I don't know), which was what I wanted, and for which I am grateful.

Re: Web browsers and trusted sites

[some guy I know]

Why not switch to a decent web browser?
...
Watcom and other trusted sites

1. I use Mozilla, which I consider to be a "decent" web browser, for the most part.
2. Why should I trust a site that won't let me browse without JavaScript turned on?

Re:really "open" source

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry about the "annoying" Javascript - its used as a cheap way to balance the load on our servers, randomly switching between various download locations. With out this we were getting swamped on a regular basis by the number of downloads on our primary server. AndrewB

Re:really "open" source

[91degrees]

Would a bittorrent mirror be sensible here?

In defense of GCC

[MarcQuadra]

WEll from what I can see GCC is moving inthe right direction, the new DFA pipeline descriptors will allow the optimizer to operate MUCH more efficiently (and they're easier to write!). GCC-3.4 has a lot of goodies for the AMD-K[7,8] series of CPUs.

Development has always been and probably always will be one of the most demanding tasks you can do, even the most complex compiles on my machine (KDE, Glibc, Mozilla, etc.) max out at abot 70MB/process, which leaves me PLENTY of RAM to play with on a -j3 compile before I hit swap on my now industry-standard 512MB machine. If you're doing a lot of compiling on a less-than-standard machine you ought to buy some DIMMS, not complain about the world's most broadly-based compiler not running a tight ship on your system.

I for one would welcome a 20% runtime performance boost for an 80% increase in GCC compile-time. Compiles happen MUCH more rarely than executes in ANY circumstance.