Re: [9fans] I can not remember if I sent this or not: MIPS-64 (sort of) notebook

[Russ Cox <rsc@swtch.com>]

ron is suggesting is that with minimal effort
the plan 9 kernel could be made to compile
using gcc instead of the standard plan 9 compilers.
he's right.

erik's point is that once you have a kernel up,
you still need to give it executables to run.
this either requires porting the standard compilers
to the target machine or somehow making
the entire source tree compile under gcc,
which would require significantly more effort
than the kernel.  he's also right.

it all depends on what you want from plan 9.

for me, the fleet plan 9 compilers save me
so much time and make me so much more
productive compared to waiting on gcc that
on balance i'd rather spend the time to port
the compiler than switch to gcc.

ron is already using gcc to generate binaries
to run on plan 9, though, and his use of plan 9
depends much more heavily on the "plays well
with networks" aspect than it does on the
fast compilation.  and maybe there's no one
to write the new compiler.  there, using gcc might
make sense.

russ