Allowing cc/c++ To Be More Easily Changed Out Has Been Deferred To Fedora 34

Proposed last year for Fedora 32 was aiming to make it easier to swap out GCC for other alternate compilers (like Clang) by using the update-alternatives functionality on Fedora for handling the /usr/bin/cc and /usr/bin/c++ symbolic links. That work was deferred to Fedora 33 as it wasn't completed in time while now it's been deferred yet again to Fedora 34 next year.

For not being wrapped up in time the update-alternatives plan for cc/c++ has been pushed back by the Fedora Engineering and Steering Committee to Fedora 34, the release expected in spring 2021. The change has been about having update-alternatives manage the cc/c++ symlinks by modifying the GCC package. Also, modifying the LLVM Clang package too so it can be used as alternatives for these default C and C++ compiler commands.

The change has been pursued so users/developers can more easily swap out their system compiler for Clang, make it easier to setup alternative build environments for testing, installing a GCC wrapper script more easily for various use-cases, and also for more easily switching to development versions of GCC.

But at this week's FESCo meeting the feature is pushed to Fedora 34. Let's hope the work will get completed finally next cycle.