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On Fri, Jan 08, 2010 at 11:32:24PM -0500, Matt Turner wrote: |
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> I don't see any point in using the o32 ABI, so I tried the 2006.1 n32 |
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> stage (the _latest_ is 2006.1...) and after a couple failed attempts, |
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> I've decided it's too far gone to be of any use. |
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|
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An attempt to install an almost four year old stage is doomed to fail. |
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Gentoo has got new EAPI's and such, and the version of Portage shipped |
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in those stages is probably going to explode immediately after the |
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initial sync. |
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|
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o32 has always been the most well-supported MIPS ABI for Gentoo/MIPS |
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installations. I didn't even do an n32 or n64 stage for the 2007.0 |
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release mainly due to lack of time and such. Consider o32 to be the most |
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stable ABI for your Gentoo setup as it is today. You could, of course, |
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easily start experimenting with it as well. |
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|
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> On top if that, the Gentoo devmanual states [0] that in order to mark |
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> a package as ~mips, "[t]he package should work on both big and little |
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> endian systems, on both pure 32 bit and pure 64 bit systems and on |
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> systems with differing kernel and userland ABIs." That means testing |
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> on (big endian/little endian) x (32bit/64bit/mixed kernel/user) x |
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> (o32/n32/n64) == 18 potential combinations. (I guess actually less. |
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> I'm not sure how you could have an o32-pure-64-bit system for |
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> instance). |
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|
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I personally never really cared about little-endian systems and I'd |
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guess that most of Gentoo/MIPS development team doesn't care either. |
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It's very difficult to get non-router-sized little-endian MIPS-based |
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machines, so it is almost impossible to do something even remotely |
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useful with Gentoo on those machines. Little-endian MIPS porting has |
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always been done by those who had access to the hardware (for example: |
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Cobalt machines) and has been silently ignored by everyone else. |
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|
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Usually you can just stick to testing packages on whatever you are |
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running, but for most critical system packages, it is really a good idea |
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to test it on non-o32 ABI's as well. |
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|
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> God. Let's dump o32 already. That cuts the number to 12. At this |
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> point, it's still ridiculous to ask a single developer to test this |
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> many configurations. Split ~mips into ~mips-be and ~mips-le or |
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> something. This would certainly make it more manageable. Whatever the |
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> case, we've got to limit the range of possible configurations. |
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|
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That would require a much more active MIPS team. It may sound silly that |
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getting rid of an ABI takes time, but getting rid of the "main" ABI is |
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not a very easy task. |
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|
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> Well. There are two developers on IRC. I talk to them occasionally, |
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> but I don't think constant prodding is the way to productivity. |
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|
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How so? That's how I ended up joining Gentoo/MIPS some years ago. |
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|
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-- |
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Alexander Færøy |