GCC 4.6/4.7 vs. LLVM-Clang 3.0/3.1 Compilers

[vertexSymphony]

Say Apple for some reason makes clang proprietary, can the open source community not fork and continue to develop the last open source version of clang before it became proprietary?

They can't "make clang proprietary". they can take the code, re-license and start a privative fork off that ... but in that case the code of clang would still be open and the community can keep the work with it.
GPL doesn't give any *absoluto* warranty about privative abuse (as some people want you to think), we had PLENTY of examples of that even in the kernel itself (if we put it that way). so this is nonsense, lot's of BSD-licensed projects may be forked or re-used partially, but the original project is still open ... so no, it doesn't threaten in any way the FOSS community. but as I said in the previous thread: licensing is a hard topic, the BSD is a license that is hard to pick where to use. in some cases it's a better choice than GPL, sometimes it's the other way.

It's not a black or white thing, it's a topic with much more colors.

Regards.

P.S → Here's an article I cited in the previous thread that I would like to link again : http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/05...rs_and_takers/

[jayrulez]

Google, Facebook, Red Hat, VMware, Cray, etc. etc. all employ far more Clang/LLVM developers than Apple does. They will keep it open. I'm at a C++ SG meeting hosted by Microsoft, and I heard from Chandler Carruth (Google) that the LLVM community are getting LLVM/Clamg moved to be managed by its own non-profit, so community direction and ownership should cease to be anything but a straw man hypothetical soon. It'll be no different than fearing that Apache might turn proprietary tomorrow.

So far as "why Clang," the answer continues to be "tools". GCC is all but useless for IDE code completion and custom static analysis, and is outright completely useless for automated refactoring and code transformations, as GCC intentionally lacks the necessary information in its AST.

GCC is also difficult to hack on, which is why so many people who want to work on compilers for fun have jumped on the Clang train. GCC works very well, yes, but only because there is a small core of very dedicated folks who've spent a decade or more accumulating knowledge on the code base. GCC may even be at greater risk of disappearing when you rely on it, because the project has a large "bus factor": too much of its success is dependent on a small number of very difficult to replace people. Clang is easy to jump into and hence getting new people up to expert levels on its internals is much much easier.

Thank you elanthis. I understand this. However, my question was an hypothetical "if" which I would still like a factual answer for. I'm not afraid llvm-clang will be taken one day and I highly doubt it will be. I Just want to understand what would be possible "if" it does.

[XorEaxEax]

Why is there no -O flag set on the 7-zip test? It's absolotely pointless to benchmark code when you don't actually use ANY optimizations.

[scottishduck]

GPL does not give vested interests the ability to screw everyone over.

Except that GPL is a vested interest in itself.

GCC codebase is a mess and poorly documented. LLVM is clean and well documented. That's why clang is exciting.

[elanthis]

Say Apple for some reason makes clang proprietary, can the open source community not fork and continue to develop the last open source version of clang before it became proprietary?

Google, Facebook, Red Hat, VMware, Cray, etc. etc. all employ far more Clang/LLVM developers than Apple does. They will keep it open. I'm at a C++ SG meeting hosted by Microsoft, and I heard from Chandler Carruth (Google) that the LLVM community are getting LLVM/Clamg moved to be managed by its own non-profit, so community direction and ownership should cease to be anything but a straw man hypothetical soon. It'll be no different than fearing that Apache might turn proprietary tomorrow.

So far as "why Clang," the answer continues to be "tools". GCC is all but useless for IDE code completion and custom static analysis, and is outright completely useless for automated refactoring and code transformations, as GCC intentionally lacks the necessary information in its AST.

GCC is also difficult to hack on, which is why so many people who want to work on compilers for fun have jumped on the Clang train. GCC works very well, yes, but only because there is a small core of very dedicated folks who've spent a decade or more accumulating knowledge on the code base. GCC may even be at greater risk of disappearing when you rely on it, because the project has a large "bus factor": too much of its success is dependent on a small number of very difficult to replace people. Clang is easy to jump into and hence getting new people up to expert levels on its internals is much much easier.

[jayrulez]

Say Apple for some reason makes clang proprietary, can the open source community not fork and continue to develop the last open source version of clang before it became proprietary?

[bachinchi]

how on earth did you come to that conclusion?

I have made factual observations that have ramifications should clang become the new standard compiler.

I like honest debate RealNC. You however seem to be in the business of making cheap-shot accusations.

- BSD gives selfish interests the ability to screw everyone over.
That's fine by the way. I am NOT suggesting that you should not rely on BSD licensed software if you want to. I'd just like to make sure everyone is clear on the potential problems of using such software.

GPL does not give vested interests the ability to screw everyone over.

Oh no that flamewar again. Please just stop it before this grows.

We all know the differences between GPL-like (copyleft) and BSD-like licenses.

[fnoss]

that was my first post...

how on earth did you come to that conclusion?

I have made factual observations that have ramifications should clang become the new standard compiler.

I like honest debate RealNC. You however seem to be in the business of making cheap-shot accusations.

- BSD gives selfish interests the ability to screw everyone over.
That's fine by the way. I am NOT suggesting that you should not rely on BSD licensed software if you want to. I'd just like to make sure everyone is clear on the potential problems of using such software.

GPL does not give vested interests the ability to screw everyone over.

[RealNC]

Please ignore the troll. Do NOT reply to him.

[fnoss]

No its not

Clang is further away then it was before the last update. GCC 4.7 has made significant gains on its self and is still a much better all round choice for the vast majority of use cases.

Why on earth would anyone replace a perfectly good compiler that is guaranteed to remain free software, with something that can be taken proprietary at any point? Even if there are small gains to be had (which there are not) risk that your compiler can be closed off to you (BSD Licence) vs no risk of the compiler being closed off (GPL) seems like a fairly obvious choice to me.


I am wondering why this site is so interested in clang. maybe there are some vested interests? I can't see any other reason for it...