Re: [avr-libc-dev] [bug #28837] using PSTR with c++ produces warnings

[Weddington, Eric]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: address@hidden
> [mailto:address@hidden On
> Behalf Of Joerg Wunsch
> Sent: Saturday, October 29, 2011 4:25 PM
> To: address@hidden
> Subject: Re: [avr-libc-dev] [bug #28837] using PSTR with c++ produces
> warnings
> 
> As Volker Kuhlmann wrote:
> 
> > > Just because someone at Arduino thinks ``4.4.x and 4.5.x seem to
have
> > > various problems'' is enough to make you not using them?
> >
> > Yes, definitely. Why?
> >
> > I have no other information and know nothing about the avr-gcc
specific
> > issues in gcc.
> 
> The least you could expect them is to explicitly mention *which*
> problems they have found, either (and preferrably) as references to
> GCC bug reports, or at least, as detailed descriptions about the
> problems someone encountered.
> 
> Without that, it's just babbling.  FUD.  (Fear, uncertainty, and
> doubt.)  I could tell you as well about GCC 4.3.x having ``several
> problems'', and by digging through the GCC bug database, I could
> probably even found this sentences with some substance. ;-)
> 

Volker, Joerg,

To be fair, the Arduino project is like any other open source project in
that they are chronically short of help and they can only focus on there
area of expertise.

I've talked quite a bit with one of the co-founders of the project, met
the whole team, and various other people who help here and there on the
Arduino project.

The Arduino project focuses on a number of things:
- Their hardware design
- Their IDE / language
- Their support libraries

What they don't do is the toolchain themselves. Two reasons why Arduino
was able to easily get off the ground is the fact that the AVR
microcontroller itself is easy to use, and the fact that there is a
free/open source toolchain (GCC) for the AVR. It also helped that WinAVR
existed as they just dropped the WinAVR toolchain in their installer
package for the Windows platform.

So please realize that they are not *trying* to spread FUD. They just
don't have the resources to tackle the toolchain issues in-depth.

The last thing to remember is that they (Arduino) exercise different
areas of the toolchain then most other people. Most users of the AVR GCC
toolchain use the C compiler. The Arduino community is the first large
set of users that use the C++ compiler for the AVR, which admittedly,
hasn't gotten much attention previously.

HTH,
Eric Weddington