Re: Move GDB to C++ ?

[Eli Zaretskii <eliz at gnu dot org>]

> From:  Vladimir Prus <vladimir@codesourcery.com>
> Date:  Tue, 29 Jul 2008 21:28:05 +0400
> 
> 1. GDB is made compiled with C++ compiler, with resulting errors removed.
> 2. I refactor struct value, and folks get to comment if the resulting code
> is better, or worse, than what we have.
> 
> Comments?

My only comment is a question: what for?  I simply don't see the
intended purpose or the goal of this.

I happen to manage software projects for a living, and whenever we
need to upgrade or change some of our tools, it is always because we
need to do something that is impossible or very inconvenient with the
existing ones.  We never do it out of some abstract wish of "improving
the design" or "refactoring" for their own sake.

So will someone please tell, loud and clear: what do we want to do the
day after GDB is rewritten in C++?  Let's suppose that we magically
fast-forward to the day after everything was refactored and GDB is
110% pure, OO, C++ -- what will we do the next day that we cannot or
have difficulties doing today?

Unless we can answer this question, refactoring and rewriting is
simply waste of resources, nothing less, nothing more.