The SPARC target

Mark Kettenis
2003-08-17T20:48:55Z

Folks,

The SPARC target has been unmaintained for quite some time now[1]
(since november 2001) and it shows. It doesn't compile on FreeBSD,
and running the testsuite on FreeBSD/sparc64 (after fixing it),
Solaris 2.8 and NetBSD/sparc results in hundreds of unexpected
failures with quite a few unresolved testcases. I think the target is
bordering on (un)usability.

It's obvious what's wrong: the code is in a very bad shape. It's
deprecation and obsoletion everywhere. It's gotten to a point where
*I* can't make any sense out of it anymore. Instead of fixing the old
broken code, I started implementing a FreeBSD/sparc64 target from
scratch. Even though my work isn't finished yet, it already does a
better job than the existing SPARC target. Of course it uses the new
unwinder framework. I hope to be able to finish it in the coming
weeks, and check it in alongide the old code. The new target is
64-bit only (which is fine for FreeBSD/sparc64), but I have
anticipated on writing the 32-bit bits. When those are ready I intend
to convert all "active" SPARC targets to use the new code, replacing
the old 32-bit code with the new 32-bit code. Unfortunately, I won't
be able to test all SPARC targets. As a result we'll probably end up
with a number of broken SPARC targets. Consider this message as a
HEADS UP.

Mark

[1] Maintenance only since november 2001 according to the CVS hostory
of the MAINTAINERS file.