Re: [PATCH 1 of 2] cross-gdb: add XML support

[BenoÃt THÃBAUDEAU <benoit dot thebaudeau at advansee dot com>]

Yann, all,

> I am not too fond of this patch for two reasons:
>
> 1) libexpat should be provided by the host:
>    - in case of cross-compilation, it should be installed on your
>    distro.
>      If you want a static gdb, then also install the -dev package
>      from your
>      distro;
>    - in case of canadian-cross, your upper-layer build-system should
>    install
>      libexpat itself.
>
>   Note that the companion libraries are a bit special, as, until
>   recently,
>   distros were not shipping them, or were shipping out-dated
>   versions. This
>   is not the case for libexpat.

I think that keeping the current behavior is an issue. BuildRoot and
many other build environments download and build locally host packages
other packages depend on. In this way, there are no dependencies on
the packages installed on the build system, both for build and runtime.

In CT-NG, building GDB with or without libexpat will succeed, without
the user even knowing that could make a difference. It also means that
a build of a toolchain performed with CT-NG is not reliably reproducible
only from the .config file.

> 2) code duplication to build libexpat
>    - at least, provide a function that build libexpat, and takes as
>      arguments: prefix, build and host
>    - better yet, include it in the companion libraries
>    infrastructure,
>      even if there is no option and no version selection.

That could be done if you changed your mind on 1).

Regards,
BenoÃt

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