On 27/05/2015 17:51, Irrwahn wrote:
No intention to lessen your main point, but that last observation does not come as a surprise. Development systems inherently have an installation overhead compared to simple runtime environments, it's always been that way.
Oh, definitely. My router doesn't need a C compiler, or make, or even a shell, to run. (True: at no point in its normal operation does it call a single shell script.) However, I still have those installed, because keeping the production environment and the build environment separate is kind of an exercise in futility, and a waste of time, when you have gigabytes of SSD to spare. For my previous router, which didn't have any storage space except for a 32 MB CompactFlash card, I definitely built the image offline. It worked well, but the development cycle was a bit uncomfortable :) My point was that when you're that close to the kernel, when you're doing pure C development at a low level, you should need a shell, some POSIX utilities such as sed/grep, a C toolchain, and make. *That's it*. Anything more than that is bloat - and in particular, when you're Linux- specific, i.e. not even trying to be portable, autotools is not an asset, it's a hindrance. (I won't make a lot of friends by saying that, but it's okay. Feel free to ignore me.)
However, it amazes me what heaps of packages one has to wade through to get a minimal usable GNU/Linux system /capable of replicating itself/. (I'm currently digging my way through Linux from scratch, as an educational exercise.)
Yeah, well, the problem with self-replication is that it starts with a C toolchain, and bootstrapping the GNU toolchain is an adventure of its own - you can't exactly call that simple or lightweight software. (Unfortunately, I'm not aware of any working alternative so far. AFAIK, clang/llvm can't bootstrap itself.) I've never delved into the nine circles of toolchain building and self-replication myself, because another guy has already done all the hard work: http://landley.net/aboriginal/ (Yes, I do love that project. It's an awesome time-saver.) -- Laurent _______________________________________________ Dng mailing list Dng@lists.dyne.org https://mailinglists.dyne.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/dng
