[ On Monday, October 29, 2001 at 16:54:43 (-0500), Andrew Cagney wrote: ]
> Subject: Re: Embedded NetBSD?
>
> Greg A. Woods wrote:
> > 
> > Why?  Especially when it means everyone else using NetBSD must
> > effectively jump through unreasonable hoops!
> > 
> > NetBSD is a far more suitable environment for hosting its own
> > development as an embedded system than any other platform could ever
> > possibly be!
> 
> Sorry, but this is funny.  Time passes the words change but the issue 
> remains the same.  This time the buzword is embedded.  Last time it was 
> portability.

Yeah, well, what do you expect?   NetBSD is, by definition, the best
host platform for its own development since it is a proper self-hosting
system.

> It is wrong to assume that someone porting NetBSD to a new platorm will 
> have access to an existing [native] NetBSD environment.

Now that NetBSD (almost) supports full cross-builds, you're almost
certainly wrong on that point, and more importantly you're definitely
wrong if the alternate platform is running on hardware that would itself
support native NetBSD.

Indeed soon any existing natively supported platform will suffice for
hosting NetBSD porting to some other platform.

>  It is 
> reasonable, however, to assume that they will have access to a UNIX like 
> environment such as AIX, MINIX, Linux, CYGWIN, OpenBSD and even, gasp, 
> NetBSD.

The assumption should be that the filesystems on which the source files
will be stored are similar enough to the native host environment that no
changes be required in the source tree hierarchy and naming.  It would
seem that necessarily rules out use of antiquated systems, even when
they've been coerced too look somewhat unix-like, such as Cygwin, U/Win,
etc.

-- 
							Greg A. Woods

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