Building Swarm, which gcc, which Swarm snapshot, etc. (was Re:

[Paul Johnson]

It must be the season for new swarm installs, because I've gotten 5 or 6 
messages like this. The real expert on this is Marcus Daniels, I am just 
telling you what I think he has taught me.  I'm certainly more verbose 
than he is, but I'm a professor, and that's like a having a license for 
it :)  I'm going to try to write down everything I can remember on this 
issue and then in the future we can refer people who ask to this thread. 
I sincerely hope i do not cause more confusion than I clear up.

First, I wonder if you couldn't try to install the RPMs I build for 
RedHat systems?  It used to be Mandrake was identical to RedHat, except 
they compiled packages with i686 optimization. I realize they have some 
GUI changes in the last year, but it seems worth a try.

If you build your own,the story is this: gcc-2.96 is not a real release 
from the GCC team. We could not get it to work at several stages. I know 
for certain the one in RH7.0 did not work, but we were able to patch 
both it and Swarm to make it work.  There were flaws in some snapshots 
of that compiler, and a dig into the problems exposed a couple of places 
where we could improve Swarm itself. My recollection is that, even if 
you use the "perfected" version of 2.96, Swarm-2.1.1 does not compile. A 
newer snapshot of Swarm will, however. I think that conversation is in 
bugzilla.redhat.com still.

Anyway, to build swarm-2.1.1 as it was distributed, you probably must 
step back to gcc 2.95.3. It could be gcc3 will work, but I don't know. I 
am certain 2.95.3 works. On RedHat 7.2, there is gcc-2.96.?? as well as 
gcc3 and I have patched and rebuilt their gcc3 to make better Swarm.  I 
think the last time I did that it was gcc-3.0.1 and the RPMS are in my 
software directory (see page address below).  Alternately, I have a 
patched edition of gcc-2.95.2 as well as 2.95.3. 
http://lark.cc.ukans.edu/~pauljohn/Swarm/miscSupportSoftware/
My recollection is that there was a change in the GNU C library between 
redhat 5 and 6 which meant that my 2.95.2 rpms did not work on the newer 
system, and that's why I have 2.95.3.

If you are going to the trouble of building swarm, I'd suggest getting 
the newest source from the testing directory 
ftp://ftp.swarm.org/pub/swarm/src/testing/ and using a patched version 
of gcc3.

In Swarm-2.1.1, the gcc patch was needed only for cosmetic reasons, it 
makes an annoying warning go away when swarm programs are built.  On the 
other hand, if you get a swarm snap from summer of 2001 or newer, there 
is one default setting for optimization which assumes you are using 
gcc-3.0.x that has been patched to allow some some special magic that 
Marcus Daniels worked out. (My recollection about the critical line is 
below)

Right at this minute, I can't find the directory in Swarm ftp where 
those patches are stored, but in my source directory I have my verbosely 
renamed versions of some of them and I've copied them to my page and you 
can see for yourself. Marcus modestly named these "objc.diff" or such, 
and when I rebuilt the RPMS for gcc I put his name on there to make sure 
I would not lose them.

for gcc 3.0.1
http://lark.cc.ukans.edu/~pauljohn/Swarm/Marcus_objc_gcc301.patch
I believe that is the same file as this one I find in Swarm ftp
ftp://ftp.swarm.org/pub/swarm/src/testing/objc.diffs

for gcc 2.95.2
http://lark.cc.ukans.edu/~pauljohn/Swarm/Marcusobjc-gcc295.patch

I don't know if there is a new patch for gcc-3.0.4.

It gets very hard for me to remember exactly which compiler works on 
exactly which edition of which system, but the current Swarm snapshot 
compiles well with a patched gcc3. RedHat RPM system makes this easier 
because, except when I run out of file space, I can always look at the 
SRPM and SPEC file to see what the patches were, as you see here
http://lark.cc.ukans.edu/~pauljohn/Swarm/miscSupportSoftware/gcc-upgrades/3.0.1/gcc-3.0.1-0.1PJ.src.rpm
or
http://lark.cc.ukans.edu/~pauljohn/Swarm/miscSupportSoftware/gcc-upgrades/2.95.3/gcc-2.95.3-27.src.rpm

If your Mandrake system is still like RedHat, then you have the gcc3 
packages, and if you want to rebuild them for your  system, I have the 
SRPM file here:
http://lark.cc.ukans.edu/~pauljohn/Swarm/miscSupportSoftware/gcc-upgrades/3.0.1RH72/gcc3-3.0.1-3.src.rpm

My recollection is that, if you want to build a current snapshot of 
Swarm without patching gcc-3.0.1, then it is necessary to make one small 
change in the Swarm source, in interface.el.  I think you want to put a 
semicolon in to reverse the effect of this patch:

*** interface.el-original       Sun Jul  8 19:22:33 2001
--- interface.el        Sun Jul  8 19:22:56 2001
***************
*** 625,631 ****

  (defun create-dispatch-hash-table (protocol phase)
    (let ((ht (make-hash-table)))
!     ;(load-dispatch-hash-table protocol phase ht)
      ht))

  (defun c-objc-type (type)
--- 625,631 ----

  (defun create-dispatch-hash-table (protocol phase)
    (let ((ht (make-hash-table)))
!     (load-dispatch-hash-table protocol phase ht)
      ht))

  (defun c-objc-type (type)

This feature, which uses the special gcc fix Marcus make, allows for 
fast method lookups.

Now I'm holding up my right hand and taking the oath: I believe this is 
all the information that is fit to print.

pj


Marcello Gallucci wrote:
> Hello
> I'm compling swarm-2.1.1 on  linux (Mandrake 8.1, i596, kernel 2.4),
> using gcc 2.96 (plus emacs, gperf, tcl8.3 tk8.3 libBTL etc).
> When I complile I get this error:
>
> In file included from activity.m:12:
> activity.h:516:2: invalid preprocessing directive #&
> activity.h:553:2: invalid preprocessing directive #"481"
>
> I've checked activity.h and there is nothing strange at line 516 or
> 513. there are actually comments at those lines.
> Any help
> thanks a lot
> marcello



--
Paul E. Johnson                       email: address@hidden
Dept. of Political Science            http://lark.cc.ku.edu/~pauljohn
University of Kansas                  Office: (785) 864-9086
Lawrence, Kansas 66045                FAX: (785) 864-5700


                 ==================================
  Swarm-Support is for discussion of the technical details of the day
  to day usage of Swarm.  For list administration needs (esp.
  [un]subscribing), please send a message to <address@hidden>
  with "help" in the body of the message.