Re: Release on April 18th?

[Efraim Flashner]

On Wed, Mar 10, 2021 at 02:27:47PM +0100, zimoun wrote:
> Hi Chris,
> 
> On Tue, 09 Mar 2021 at 10:17, Chris Marusich <cmmarusich@gmail.com> wrote:
> > zimoun <zimon.toutoune@gmail.com> writes:
> >
> >> Is it doable to have core-updates merged in the next weeks?  Or not at
> >> all.
> >
> > Do we plan to upgrade GCC?  This is required for the powerpc64le-linux
> > port; see below for details.
> 
> You mean replace gcc-7 by gcc-8 or greater, right?  It implies a
> core-updates merge, right?
> 
> 
> > The wip-ppc64le branch, which ports Guix to an architecture that can be
> > run on freedom-friendly POWER9 systems like the Talos II and Blackbird
> > from Raptor Computing Systems, is "almost" done, and I would really like
> > to try to get it into the next release if possible.
> 
> Could be cool!
> 
> > However, there is still some work to do, and I wouldn't necessarily want
> > to block the release just for sake of the powerpc64le-linux port.
> >
> > In fact, the wip-ppc64le branch was "fully functional" for a little
> > while.  By "fully functional," I mean that "make check" succeeded, "make
> > guix-binary.powerpc64le-linux.tar.xz" succeeded, the resulting binary
> > could be installed on a fresh Debian ppc64le system, the binary could
> > successfully build and run GNU Hello, and the binary could successfully
> > run "guix pull", and the newly installed "guix pull" could do the same.
> >
> > However, that was using glibc 2.31.  On core-updates, glibc has been
> > updated to 2.32, which unfortunately breaks wip-ppc64le.  To fix it, we
> > must upgrade GCC from 7 to 8 (or greater), and that is what we have done
> > on the wip-ppc64le branch (upgrade GCC to 8).  Currently, we are working
> > through build failures that occurred as a result, but I'm optimistic that
> > we can resolve those in the coming weeks.
> 
> Thanks for the explanations.
> 
> 
> > The real question, I think, is when do we plan to upgrade GCC on
> > core-updates?  It's still on GCC 7.5.0.  The powerpc64le-linux port will
> > require GCC 8 or greater, since core-updates is now using glibc 2.32.
> 
> Does it make sense to merge wip-ppc64le and core-updates?
> 

I wanted an Easy Win™ and I've pushed a branch wip-ppc64le-for-master,
which cherry-picked (I think) all of the powerpc64le commits and
adjusted them to work against master WITHOUT affecting other
architectures.

I don't know why I thought it was an easy win, but if it looks good to
everyone I don't see why we couldn't merge powerpc64le into master by
the end of the week.

-- 
Efraim Flashner   <efraim@flashner.co.il>   אפרים פלשנר
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