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I am not entirely sure why you got downvoted so much - probably due to the 'attacking GCC' part which I disagree with you on, but for what it's worth I agree wi

I am not entirely sure why you got downvoted so much - probably due to the 'attacking GCC' part which I disagree with you on, but for what it's worth I agree with your point that proprietary modules and forks are a risk with precedence. For instance Apple came out with A8X which I am sure required special clang codegen optimizations - where is that code? If that continues to sit behind Apple's closed walls then it's already proving OP's point.

ajross 12y ago
Exactly. The lack of Apple's release of its LLVM/clang code for its popular platform is a problem. And it might be a reasonable argument to make about copyleft in the abstract (c.f. Apple's very different behavior toward WebKit which was enforced by license). But it's not an argument against clang, which remains a high quality free software compiler and one worth using. And citing the existence of said free software as evidence for the "end" of free compilers seems... weird.
- blinkingled 12y ago
  > But it's not an argument against clang Well, one could argue that clang and its license are inseparable and if the license enables the reality that more and more higher quality stuff remains proprietary and that the source-available clang version remains a step child or second class citizen then your "high quality free software compiler" point becomes at least partially invalid. If on the other hand GCC's license means more companies contributed in the open and only a single first class product remained equally available to everyone then GCC ended up being a better product than clang.
  - ajross 12y ago
    But if you made that argument you'd have to make it with facts. :) The plain truth is that clang is free software, and (c.f. linked article) is very much a "first class citizen" in existing free software environments. Apple's variant is not free software, and that sucks. So it seems reasonable to argue that it would have been "better" had LLVM been copyleft. But that only extends as far as the facts on the ground, so arguing that we're seeing the "end of free compilers" seems silly to me.
    - blinkingled 12y ago
      > But if you made that argument you'd have to make it with facts. We don't have enough facts yet to make the determination - clang is fairly young still - but for now we do have precedences and motives. Precedences you can look up and motives - well Apple dumped GCC because they wanted to be able to do things without legally being required to publish source. So it isn't entirely without reason to wonder if clang will face a second class future due to its license.
      - mwfunk 12y ago
        There are many, many reasons people might want to avoid the GPL that have nothing to do with wanting to get out of a legal obligation to publish source. The FLOSS world is filled with innumerable high-profile, very successful projects that avoided the GPL for reasons that had nothing to do with wanting to keep some things proprietary. Sometimes people just want to share software without making a political statement that they may not agree with, or imposing a legal and/or social burden on others (or assuming one for themselves). The adversarial, black-and-white, with-us-or-against-us accusations that some GPL advocates are known for are actually a big reason why many people don't like the GPL, and associate it with carrying a lot of baggage in addition to the actual legalese that defines the license.
      - DannyBee 12y ago
        "well Apple dumped GCC because they wanted to be able to do things without legally being required to publish source." Apple dumped GCC because they wanted control over their own destiny. They could not get GCC to go in the direction they wanted, and it was just a much larger amount of engineering effort to accomplish their goal. Apple gave not a crap about publishing source to their GCC changes. In fact, they wished they could get more changes into GCC. The licensing stuff is tangential. Yes, it's their stated reason, but it's a cover story. Do you really think lawyers run Apple?
        deng 12y ago
        > The licensing stuff is tangential. Yes, it's their stated reason, but it's a cover story. So it's a pure coincidence they stopped updating gcc in OSX right when it moved to GPLv3? And the reason they stopped updating bash, Emacs, etc., and dumped Samba, is also because those projects didn't move in the direction they wanted?
  - serge2k 12y ago
    No, it doesn't. Clang is a high quality free software compiler regardless of if Apple has a proprietary internal addon that makes it better. GCC isn't a better product now, what makes you think it will be in the future other than the license?
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]

ajross 12y ago

Exactly. The lack of Apple's release of its LLVM/clang code for its popular platform is a problem. And it might be a reasonable argument to make about copyleft in the abstract (c.f. Apple's very different behavior toward WebKit which was enforced by license). But it's not an argument against clang, which remains a high quality free software compiler and one worth using. And citing the existence of said free software as evidence for the "end" of free compilers seems... weird.

blinkingled 12y ago
> But it's not an argument against clang Well, one could argue that clang and its license are inseparable and if the license enables the reality that more and more higher quality stuff remains proprietary and that the source-available clang version remains a step child or second class citizen then your "high quality free software compiler" point becomes at least partially invalid. If on the other hand GCC's license means more companies contributed in the open and only a single first class product remained equally available to everyone then GCC ended up being a better product than clang.
- ajross 12y ago
  But if you made that argument you'd have to make it with facts. :) The plain truth is that clang is free software, and (c.f. linked article) is very much a "first class citizen" in existing free software environments. Apple's variant is not free software, and that sucks. So it seems reasonable to argue that it would have been "better" had LLVM been copyleft. But that only extends as far as the facts on the ground, so arguing that we're seeing the "end of free compilers" seems silly to me.
  - blinkingled 12y ago
    > But if you made that argument you'd have to make it with facts. We don't have enough facts yet to make the determination - clang is fairly young still - but for now we do have precedences and motives. Precedences you can look up and motives - well Apple dumped GCC because they wanted to be able to do things without legally being required to publish source. So it isn't entirely without reason to wonder if clang will face a second class future due to its license.
    - mwfunk 12y ago
      There are many, many reasons people might want to avoid the GPL that have nothing to do with wanting to get out of a legal obligation to publish source. The FLOSS world is filled with innumerable high-profile, very successful projects that avoided the GPL for reasons that had nothing to do with wanting to keep some things proprietary. Sometimes people just want to share software without making a political statement that they may not agree with, or imposing a legal and/or social burden on others (or assuming one for themselves). The adversarial, black-and-white, with-us-or-against-us accusations that some GPL advocates are known for are actually a big reason why many people don't like the GPL, and associate it with carrying a lot of baggage in addition to the actual legalese that defines the license.
    - DannyBee 12y ago
      "well Apple dumped GCC because they wanted to be able to do things without legally being required to publish source." Apple dumped GCC because they wanted control over their own destiny. They could not get GCC to go in the direction they wanted, and it was just a much larger amount of engineering effort to accomplish their goal. Apple gave not a crap about publishing source to their GCC changes. In fact, they wished they could get more changes into GCC. The licensing stuff is tangential. Yes, it's their stated reason, but it's a cover story. Do you really think lawyers run Apple?
      - deng 12y ago
        > The licensing stuff is tangential. Yes, it's their stated reason, but it's a cover story. So it's a pure coincidence they stopped updating gcc in OSX right when it moved to GPLv3? And the reason they stopped updating bash, Emacs, etc., and dumped Samba, is also because those projects didn't move in the direction they wanted?
- serge2k 12y ago
  No, it doesn't. Clang is a high quality free software compiler regardless of if Apple has a proprietary internal addon that makes it better. GCC isn't a better product now, what makes you think it will be in the future other than the license?

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]