Re: PATCH RFA: Add support for Go programming language

[Ian Lance Taylor]

Ralf Wildenhues <address@hidden> writes:

> Hello Eric, Ian,
>
> * Ian Lance Taylor wrote on Tue, Oct 12, 2010 at 11:06:07PM CEST:
>> Ralf Wildenhues writes:
>> 
>> >> address@hidden AC_PROG_GO (@ovar{compiler-search-list})
>> >> +Find the Go compiler to use.  Check whether the environment variable
>> >> address@hidden is set; if so, then set output variable @code{GCCGO} to its
>> >> +value.
>> >
>> > Why name the variable GCCGO?  In line with other compiler variables
>> > would be something like GOC (for GO Compiler) or GOCC, that would also
>> > match with GOFLAGS.  Do you expect this interface to never apply to
>> > non-GCC implementations of Go?
>> 
>> There is another Go compiler, which is called either 6g or 8g depending
>> on the target, but it works differently.  It does not use a -c option to
>> compile, but instead uses a different program (6l or 8l) to link.  Also
>> these tools generate .6 or .8 files rather than .o files, and the linker
>> gets the libraries directly from the .6/.8 files rather than from the
>> command line.  So I wasn't sure whether it made sense to use the smae
>> make variable for both.
>> 
>> That said, I'm not wedded to GCCGO, and if y'all think it would be
>> better to use GOC or GOCC, I'm fine with making the change.  It's true
>> that it would be possible to write a driver program for 6g/8g which make
>> them act more like gccgo, though the reverse would be harder.
>
> Eric, do you have any input on this open question?  Have you had a
> chance to look at the patch?  It otherwise seems low-danger to me, but
> I wouldn't want to move forward on the Libtool sister patch without this
> one cleared.

I'm at the point with my gcc patches where I kind of need an answer to
this question.  The question is: what name should we use in shell and
make to refer to the Go compiler?  I've been using GCCGO.  Should we
instead use GOC or GOCC or something else?  How can we decide this?

Thanks.

Ian