Richard Kenner wrote:
No, not in that case, but I don't see that as the only case. Another case would be somebody who wanted to keep an optimizer proprietary by making it a plug-in. My view is that because of the linkage with the GCC IR, it can't be proprietary in that case, but that's the harder argument to make legally.
I don't think we can argue legalities here. All we can do is say that if they are using plug-ins, they are forced to include GPL'd header files and link against GPL'd code. The rest is up to the FSF legal folks.
I don't see that. Why is it that much harder to link in with GCC than doing it as a plugin?
Limited time and steep learning curves. Typically, researchers are interested in rapid-prototyping to keep the paper mill going. Plug-ins offers a simple method for avoiding the latencies of repeated bootstrap cycles.
Several projects will survive the initial prototyping stages and become techniques we can apply in industrial settings. We want to attract that. Plus we want to attract the grad students that did the research and graduate with a favourable attitude towards using GCC in their future career.
Diego.
