Hi,
On 7/31/10, Andreas K. Foerster list@akfoerster.de wrote:
On Sat, Jul 31, 2010 at 05:37:59AM -0500, Rugxulo wrote:
The only reason (AFAICT) to use MinGW is if you don't need POSIX and just want "fast and simple" binaries or if you dislike the Cygwin .DLL license issue.
No, I use MinGW because it is AFAICT the only compiler to build Windows executables for which you don't have to have a Windows system. ;-)
I meant vs. Cygwin. In other words, I see a lot of MinGW projects. Since both use GCC, you should "in theory" be able to cross compile from any valid host (even DJGPP). In practice, that doesn't always work (or is hard to do, at least for me).
OpenWatcom comes with libs and bins for (almost) any host or target, so the DOS-hosted version can by default target Win32, OS/2, Linux, etc. (Linux support is still considered experimental, but it seems to work okay, just no shared libs and no 64-bit.) Unlike TCC/Win32 or MinGW, it doesn't need MSVCRT (which I dislike, but anyways...).
Well, if you're not also a Linux user, how could you even know how to support Linux??
There is so much information on the Internet...
I mean how would somebody who doesn't "use" Linux a lot even have the imagination to write Linux-only features?? And a lot of the Internet is inaccurate, outdated, or disappears (bad links), argh!
but GNU does indeed target POSIX (or Linux) almost exclusively, and some GNU projects do indeed reject patches that don't fit that "ideal".
I don't see this. It's quite the opposite. Almost all GNU programs are also available for Windows. So I surely doubt that they reject code that makes their software run under Windows.
Not sure, I don't have a list offhand. I know a lot of Windows ports are unfinished or buggy. Sure, a lot of it works too. But I think GNU intentionally doesn't focus as much on Win32 because it's proprietary. (And yes, a few silly projects do reject patches out of spite.) It depends on the maintainers.
Of course they reject code that does not run on a GNU system or gives the (wrong) impression that their system is inferior. But what are you expecting? Would Microsoft support software that doesn't run on their system? That would really be a surprise! In contrast to the GNU project they don't even try to make most of their software run on other systems. And if than almost always for "bait and switch" stunts, ie. get others on the hook and when they byte and depend on it, then drop the support. That was also the only reason for them to implement POSIX support - to switch some POSIX people over to Windows.
MS is a 90,000+ employee company! Yes, they do a lot of dumb things, don't ask me why. I definitely don't agree with them much. They have so many bugs, dumb decisions, insane ads, high prices, but whatever, it's beyond me. I'm no huge Windows fan, and I don't want to really waste much time focusing on their dumb APIs.
Call me lazy or dumb myself, but I'm somewhat behind in Linux, so it's all fairly Greek to me. Even a lot of their stuff is too complex or I dislike. But hey, whatever, can't please everyone. There is no perfect OS.
(I'm on Linux now because XP hosed itself on this P4 oldie a few months ago. I've tried various distros off and on for three years. Always some few peculiar bugs and a few questionable decisions but otherwise okay. I'm no hardcore "user", though, don't need dual monitors or iTunes or Blu-Ray or AutoCad or PhotoShop or ....)
barely into Linux, but I don't think I'll ever be 100% "pro POSIX, GNU" etc. as long as their build processes and tools are so arcane and complex.
Have you tried KDevelop or Anjuta?
No, and sorry, that's not what I meant. ;-) I meant that some things are impossible to build or have horrible dependencies. In other words, I wonder what they were thinking! (This applies to any OS, lots of hard-to-reproduce builds from source code.)
P.S. I don't know, how do you decide what to support and what not to support without pissing someone off? I say the more the merrier, but I know it's hard to do.