Re: [PATCH] Add IPv6 support for remote TCP connections

[Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>]

> Date: Sun, 22 Mar 2015 18:09:32 +0100
> From: Jan Kratochvil <jan.kratochvil@redhat.com>
> Cc: gdb-patches@sourceware.org, ktietz@redhat.com, brobecker@adacore.com,
>         fercerpav@gmail.com
> 
> On Sun, 22 Mar 2015 17:53:52 +0100, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
> > Not sure what this is about, but just FYI: getaddrinfo is available
> > only since Windows XP, so earlier versions will not have it.  MinGW64
> > doesn't care about versions older than XP, so it's a small wonder it
> > compiles without a hitch.
> 
> Even MS-Windows XP is EOLed already, isn't it?

Don't EOL me ;-) One of my machines (the one I'm typing this on,
actually) still happily runs XP, and probably will for some time to
come.

> What older MS-Windows release
> should be supported?  I guess MS-Windows 2000?  Do you mean it seriously?

It's up to us to decide.  Emacs, for example, still supports Windows
98, per an explicit request from RMS, based on the large number of
users of those systems in the 3rd World.

> The patch of my attempt for gnulib import of getaddrinfo had 1.5MB and it was
> not easy due to conflict with all the existing MS-Windows #ifs in GDB code, is
> it really worth those EOLed OSes?
> 
> I am really asking, the gnulib import does not seem right to me.  This is also
> why the IPv6 support has been waiting for removal of the old OSes (like HP-UX).

Why can't we test at run time if getaddrinfo is available, and use it
if it is, else use the old code?  This will work on Windows, and is
much simpler than the gnulib rigmarole.