[MPlayer-dev-eng] [PATCH] Drop support for gcc-2.95

[Diego Biurrun]

On Mon, Jul 10, 2006 at 08:53:38AM +0300, Uoti Urpala wrote:
> The gcc 2 branch has been dead upstream for a long time. Supporting it
> requires frequent workarounds especially for variable declarations. The
> repository has already not compiled with gcc-2.95 for nearly 3 weeks and
> it seems Rich was the only person who noticed. The attached patch
> officially drops 2.95 from the list of supported versions.
> 
> The arguments I've heard for keeping gcc-2.95 support are that it
> compiles faster (though the resulting code is slower on most platforms),
> and that some platforms might not have support for newer versions.
> 
> I think that the speed argument does not justify keeping support for old
> unmaintained compiler versions, and it seems moot anyway since current
> developers apparently do not use it for faster compiles (as mentioned
> above the repository already hasn't compiled with 2.95 for nearly three
> weeks).
> 
> I do not know accurate numbers for platforms that would not support
> newer compiler versions, but unless someone can give credible numbers
> showing otherwise I don't believe they are worth keeping 2.95 support.
> Nor do I have much sympathy for such platforms, if they use
> long-obsolete versions for their toolchain they shouldn't expect to
> compile the latest client software versions.

Search the archives, I have done extensive compiler comparisons on x86 a
long time ago.  The result was that gcc 3.x prior to 3.4 just plain
sucks.  3.4 finally managed to produce binaries that are as fast as those
created by 2.95, but it takes considerably longer (40-60% IIRC).

We can discuss this once a gcc >= 3.4 is part of all mainstream
distributions (meaning at least Debian stable).  Until then it's
completely out of the question.

Diego