> On 18/05/2025 17:21 CEST Jose E. Marchesi <jema...@gnu.org> wrote: > > > [Adding in CC: > - Iain Buclaw, the D front-end maintainer for GCC. > - Arthur Cohen, the Rust front-end maintainer for GCC., > - James K. Lowden and Robert Dubner, the COBOL front-end maintainers > for GCC.] > > Hi Bruno. > > > In > > <https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/autoconf-patches/2025-04/msg00000.html> > > Paul Eggert renamed the variable A68 → A68C, with the rationale: > > "Use the shell variable A68C, not A68, > > for the compiler. This is for consistency of names compared to > > support for other languages like Go." > > > > In > > <https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/autoconf-patches/2025-05/msg00000.html> > > José Marchesi renamed the variable A68FLAGS → A68CFLAGS, with the rationale: > > "as mandated by the GCS" > > > > The result of these renamings makes no sense to me: > > > > 1) The GNU Algol 68 compiler is meant to be named 'ga68', not 'ga68c'. [1] > > The prefix 'g' is specific for the GNU implementation; it's normal > > to ignore it here, when we talk about conventions that should encompass > > non-GNU implementations as well. > > Some other GCC compilers use 'gcc' as a prefix, which I think could also > be considered "specific for the GNU implementation". If so, we would > have: > > gcc CC > g++ CXX > gdc DC > ga68 A68 > gcobol COBOL > gm2 M2 > objc OBJC > gccrs RS > gccgo GO > > > 2) The GCS [2] has examples where the variable name is the program name, > > uppercased. > > > > 3) As a result, users would be looking for a command 'a68c', but there is > > no such command. > > Yes I agree, that is bad. > > > I'm bringing this up because a similar case will be with the GNU Modula-2 > > compiler, when we want to support it in Autoconf and Automake. > > > > * The GNU Modula-2 compiler is called 'gm2'. Therefore it will be natural > > (per GCS [2]) to call the variables M2 and M2FLAGS. > > > > * Calling the variable M2C would be very very confusing, because there is > > a Modula-2 to C translator called 'm2c' [3][4][5] and, unlike gm2, it > > produces C code, not an executable. > > > > And the big picture should also consider the GNU D compiler, when we want > > to support it in Autoconf and Automake. > > > > * The GNU D compiler is called 'gdc'. Therefore, and because a 1-letter > > variable 'D' would be really odd, it makes sense to called the program > > variable 'DC'. > > > > * Whether the flags variable is then called DFLAGS (for consistency with > > CFLAGS) or DCFLAGS (per GCS [2]), can be debated. > >
WRT D env flags, this was added quite some time ago, I can't say I recall the rationale, but mirroring CC/CFLAGS seems to be what was done. However, within GCC configure/make scripts, the env variables are GDC and GDCFLAGS respectively. In the DM implementation of D, they also used DC/HOST_DC in their make scripts at one point. This is now dropped in favour of DMD/HOST_DMD. > > Proposal A: Define (I) as the more important goal. > > > > GO GOFLAGS > > > > A68 A68FLAGS > > > > M2 M2FLAGS > > > > DC DCFLAGS > > If you were to go with this convention, I think it would make more sense to name the flags D2 and D2FLAGS. Pedantically, it *is* version 2 of the language (and there's no appetite to change the versioning from 2.xxx to 3.x) - though no one expresses it that way in conversation, it's either D or dlang. Iain.
