Re: x86 fpu

[Jim Blandy <jimb at cygnus dot com>]

> I believe that H.J.'s private versions of the GNU toolchain have been
> a great disservice to both the GNU/Linux and the larger GNU
> community.

I don't really agree.  I think there are several problems with the way
they've been handled, by various parties, but in principle I think
they're an okay thing.

The proper role of a patch set series is to allow some slack between
Linux and the standard GDB distribution.  Linux users don't have to
wait until the next GDB release to get a bug fixed.  For the GDB
maintainers, the patch set can also serve as a guide to what needs to
get fixed --- it's a screened list of bug reports.

However, H.J.'s patch sets have been pushed to meet demands beyond
what they can do well.  This happened for various reasons:

- For a while, GDB releases were not frequent enough.  Under such
  conditions, patch sets will inevitably get uncomfortably large.  The
  situation is improving, here.

- For a while, the GDB maintainers did not spend much time trying to
  incorporate fixes from the net, or working with contributors to get
  things in.  I hope this has changed.  I know a lot of us at Cygnus
  have worked to improve this.

- If I were to fault H. J. at all, I might wish that he were more
  sympathetic to maintainer's objections to patches.  It's appropriate
  for a maintainer to push back on the submitter of a patch to clean
  it up, but sometimes I've felt as if H. J. were saying, "Well, it
  works for me --- take it or leave it."


The rules for patch sets should be:

- The GDB maintainers spend time incorporating patches, and make frequent
  releases, so the patch set can stay small.

- The patch set maintainer works to adapt patches to maintainers'
  concerns, again, so the patch set can stay small.

If handled that way, I think they're a healthy thing.