[csw-maintainers] Solaris Studio vs GCC

[Ben Walton]

Excerpts from Maciej (Matchek) Bliziński's message of Sun Mar 11 13:58:10 -0400 2012:

> If we plan on keeping on being standardized on Solaris Studio, we
> should have some kind of rationale written up. If it is about
> performance, we should have some numbers put out to show how big the
> benefit is. If it is about helpful error messages, we should have an
> example or two out. Whatever the reason is, some kind of example
> should be put up on one of our web sites.

There is a really big win we'd get by standardizing on gcc instead of
studio.  Our .pc files, binaries like mysql_config and other
miscellaneous things that embed compiler flags (rbconfig.rb, etc)
would be useful to a wider audience in the user community.  It would
also benefit us when building things that only compile with gcc but
rely on build flags supplied by some of the aforementioned things.

I understand that performance of the binaries generated by studio used
to be superior, but I don't know if that's still the case.  Aside from
this (possible) win for studio, what are some of the other reasons
we've traditionally preferred it to gcc?

Thanks
-Ben
--
Ben Walton
Systems Programmer - CHASS
University of Toronto
C:416.407.5610 | W:416.978.4302