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FreeBSD 10 To Use Clang Compiler, Deprecate GCC
An anonymous reader writes "Shared in last quarter's FreeBSD status report are developer plans to have LLVM/Clang become the default compiler and to deprecate GCC. Clang can now build most packages and suit well for their BSD needs. They also plan to have a full BSD-licensed C++11 stack in FreeBSD 10."
Says the article, too: "Some vendors have also been playing around with the idea of using Clang to build the Linux kernel (it's possible to do with certain kernel configurations, patches, and other headaches)."
and suit well for their BSD needs
In other words, it has the license they want. GCC was a thorn in the side of the collective BSD conscience, they didn't like it.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Having all this great open source compiler technology competing with each other is great, but one does wonder if the alienation caused by GPLv3 was worth it, as it is the primary reason both Apple and FreeBSD embraced Clang (in fact, Apple started the Clang project). As a result, GCC wasn't updated past GPLv2 on either platform. Apple couldn't integrate GCC with their IDE like they wanted, nor could FreeBSD's commercial clients work with it. Flexibility and pragmatism usually wins out over rigidness and ideology.
The derivative works companies build using BSD-licensed software are effectively proprietary software. And if they control the hardware, they can make sure it only runs binaries signed by them, so you can't even run the original unmodified code.
The GPL has never really been the issue, LLVM was offered for GPL-Next ... but the GCC maintainers have always insisted upon a monolithic compiler without standardized intermediary representations to prevent other compiler builders just using GCC as a front end and thus refused, but that's on the maintainers and not the GPL.
I've found that code that will compile properly under a variety of compilers tends to be of better quality.
One of my current projects started out on an old 2.x branch of GCC. When I finally got around to updating to a current GCC, I had to fix quite a few bugs before it would actually work - the different compiler was catching problems I hadn't noticed before.
Same when I tried compiling it under Visual Studio, or Clang - the more compilers I made it work under, the less bugs there were in the code.
Now, if a given program actually uses some special feature of GCC, that's fine - if only one compiler will do what you need, that's fine. Or if it's too much work to maintain a "port" - I stopped maintaining the VS project files a while ago, since I no longer used it. But if you have a chance to at least test it against a different compiler, go ahead and give it a shot.
Precisely who do you think has done a lot of the development on Clang/LLVM over the last few years and contributed it to the wider community?
Complaining about the GPL is like complaining that you can't play dirty pool with code licensing(see Tivoization).
I haven't heard Apple complaining about the GPL or trying to circumvent it - they're just switching to alternative projects.
Of course, its a pity, because even if if you Tivoized GPLv2 code you still had to share your source so people could learn from it, or use and modify it on other (or jailbroken) hardware, whereas now people are moving to BSD-style licenses with no such benefits... but if the FSF want to let the perfect be the enemy of the good, declare jihad on Tivoization and have a tilt at the patent windmill, that is their right.
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
Complaining about the GPL
He wasn't complaining about the GPL, he was stating (correctly) that it is one of the key reasons some groups choose not to use GCC, particularly GPL version 3 (note that FreeBSD has not used and of the recent GCC release specifically for that reason - they were fine using GPLv2).
It is a case of choosing the right tool for the job. Until recently their choice was to redefine the job (change the parts of their projects and licensing policy that GPLv3 conflicted with), keep the old tool (using older, GPLv2 licensed, releases of GCC only), or use something less stable/proven/compatible. They chose the middle option. Now option three is replaced by "use something else that is now stable/proven/compatible enough to be an alternative" they have taken that choice. Again this isn't complaining about GPLv3, it is simply refusing to use it because it is incompatible with some of their chosen goals.
I'm told there are technical reasons why Clang and the related tool chain are preferable to GCC in some circumstances too, though I'm out of the loop on that one so I don't know what they are or if they are significant to FreeBSD.
While his answer was rather terse and it would have helped to be less so (it made him appear to some, to you at least, like an anti-GPL troll), what you appear to have done in your response is set up a strawman to attack. This is the sort of thing that anti-GPL people (both within the open-source arena and external to it) will jump on as "proof" that GPL advocates are rabid loonies, so by defending the GPL in such a manner you may be harming the cause rather then helping it. You might want to be more careful not to come across that way (it may not have been you intention on this occasion, but it does seem that way by my reading).
Many people wants _real_ freedom for their software
No, they don't. If they did, they'd use GNU GPL v3.
But I think you mean the opposite of what you said: people want to be free to do whatever they want with the software, including taking away the software's freedom.
That's the thing. Free software is not about your freedom, it's about the software's freedom. It is not for the benefit of anyone in particular, it is for the benefit of the whole humanity. When you think about where rms came from, and when you read his writings, you realize that his ideal is not an indifferent "here's some code, use as you wish". It is an ideologically grounded "here's some code, it's for everyone to use, and if you build upon it, the result is also for everyone to use".
Circumcision is child abuse.
Here is what I personally don't get, maybe someone can explain it to me, but WTF was it with RMS and the TiVo? It was ONE device that had NO choice but to be made the way it was. It wasn't like TiVo was being run by Cobra Commander here, they knew that if there was a way to get the content off the device (which is EXACTLY what running custom versions would have allowed) it would have been banhammered in the west quicker than you can say "copyright infringement".
Would he have been more happy if it had used WinCE? Because that is what it feels like to me, that RMS wants ONLY true followers of "the way' to use anything GPL. And since there is multiple other OSes out there including BSD and Windows Embedded it just seems stupid to attack one specific corp and make other businesses afraid of being next on RMS' shit list and all over a device that frankly could have been made no other way without only being sold at China Mart and other "pro piracy" hardware sites.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
In a couple of years time, there will be a proliferation of different, incompatible versions of CLang/LLVM that will be increasingly expensive to maintain.
It's already happened. This is why so many companies are now actively involved in the LLVM community: it's cheaper. I'm currently on my way back from BSDCan (where I was talking a bit about the progress in switching to clang) and I was at EuroLLVM a couple of weeks earlier. Both conferences were full of corporate contributors to LLVM and FreeBSD (two projects that I work on). They like the fact that the license means that they don't need to run everything that they possibly want to do past their legal team and, over the past decade, they've all discovered (at different speeds) that it's much cheaper to engage the community and push work upstream than it is to maintain a private fork.
You get much better support from companies that join your community because they regard it as being good for them than if they dump code on you because they are legally obliged to. We don't want drive-by code dumps, we want long-term commitments to maintenance.
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I normally don't respond to ACs but this is one thing I've noticed and found interesting....anybody notice how the Anti-BSD GPLers sound a HELL of a lot like the RIAA? Both act as if copying is stealing, both come up with these giant FUD scenarios of doom which never seem to happen, and both act as if THEIR way is the only 'right" choice and frankly you are an idiot or "one of THEM!" if your views don't stay in lock step with their own.
I just find it fascinating that those that constantly scream they are for "freedom" sound a hell of a lot like the most restrictive bunch out there.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Here is what I personally don't get, maybe someone can explain it to me, but WTF was it with RMS and the TiVo? It was ONE device that had NO choice but to be made the way it was.
If it had not been TiVo it would have been something else. His problem was the use of GPLed software in that manner. While it wasn't found to break the letter of the license it broke the clearly stated spirit of the license, so that wording was updated in v3 to patch the hole.
Would he have been more happy if it had used WinCE?
Yes, basically. Or some form of BSD (the licenses used there would allow this sort of use IIRC). Or anything else not GPL licensed. They had those choices available to them.
RMS is an absolutist on this and similar matters (some would say extremist, but I feel that label to be rather too strong here): if you want to use Free, keep it Free with your use, otherwise use something else (paying for it if need be).
it just seems stupid to attack one specific corp
He wasn't going after one specific corp, just the first one that did it (visibly) first and shoring up the hole before others tried. Remember that TiVo could keep using GPLv2 software as they had already done, they'd just have to start maintaining by other means once later versions switched to GPLv3, so the switch to GPLv3 did not explicitly stop them distributing their product.
and make other businesses afraid of being next on RMS' shit list and all over a device that frankly could have been made no other way without only being sold at China Mart and other "pro piracy" hardware sites.
That is where it falls down of course, but so does every other license commercial or otherwise - if you can't enforce the license in a territory people wanting to do something against the (letter of the) licence in that territory are at an advantage to those elsewhere. "Pro piracy" regimes are not a GPL specific problem and not really relevant here - you could just as easily state that VMWare's recent licensing model changes are an attack on compliant companies.
There are many people who think RMS is wrong on the matter, of course. Linus for instance still explicitly uses GPLv2 as evidenced by it being the license git is released under (the kernel is a different matter: that could not be switched even if he wanted because of how many contributions there have been where rights were not explicitly handed over to the project).
I'm a 10 year+ FreeBSD contributor. You're all missing the point. Linux and BSD target different markets and are optimized in all ways, organization, release process, license, code, to fit these different needs. One isn't better or worse. Obviously Linux is larger in all ways than BSD but larger doesn't mean better or we'd all just be using windows. This isn't a question of llvm being better than gcc, bsd being better than linux, or bsd license being better than gpl. They are just different and do different things. Use what's appropriate for your needs and leave it at that.
I can say as a long time contributor to opensource software I am disgusted at reading the comments of blowhard 'enthusiasts' who denigrate the hard work and contributions of hundreds of people when they get in these pissing matches. I am friend with Linux kernel contributors and I can guarantee we don't flame each other in this manner.
Have you ever actually tried to parse a declaration reliably using regular expressions? I have. They just kept getting more and more horrible the more complex the input became, and at some point, after fixing a bunch of bugs, I concluded that it was an insane way of doing things, threw out all the regular expressions, and started over with a tokenizing parser.
Trust me when I say that parsing declarations with even Perl-compatible regular expressions, much less BRE or ERE, is not something you want to attempt if you value your sanity in the slightest.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.