Specific gcc builds

[Ryan Schmidt]

On Jul 2, 2010, at 23:02, Peter B. West wrote:

> Is it possible to build gcc without objective c and gcj?  Gcj, in particular, takes a looong time to build, and, having just built gcc44 as part of an outdated build, I am now in the throes of building gcc43. Fo my java builds, I currently rely on Oracle/Sun jdk 1.6. I would like to be able to cut down the update overheads by restricting the gcc build to specifics.
> 
> Any chance?

The gcc ports don't offer this option. The two main reasons why a port might declare a dependency on a gcc port is because it needs a fortran compiler or because it needs a java compiler, neither of which are provided by Apple; giving the user the option of disabling the fortran or java compiler in the gcc ports would defeat their primary purpose. It would impose an additional burden on every consumer of the gcc ports to verify that the components that port requires have been installed. It is simpler all around not to give users the option to disable these components.

The very latest gcc port at any given time (currently gcc46) does not build fortran or java support by default but offers variants to do so. The stated reasons for this difference are 1) that fortran and java support frequently break during a gcc development cycle and the maintainer of gcc still wants to be able to update to the latest snapshots to verify the rest of gcc builds, and 2) fortran and java support take a long time to build so while a gcc development port is being updated frequently it's nice not to have to wait so long to build it. Once a gcc port is stable and isn't being updated so frequently anymore, this extra time isn't so bad since it only occurs every couple months.