[kaffe] 1.0.7 release on Alpha.

[Jim Pick]

On Tue, 2002-07-02 at 13:41, Chris Meadors wrote:
> Jim Pick wrote:
> > I ran those tests on one of the Debian project's build machines (which I
> > have access to, since I'm a Debian developer).  When I get some more
> > time, I'll try to do some debugging to see exactly where it failed.  
> 
> Is that something I could do here?  I just have this Alpha sitting here 
> doing pretty much nothing.  Just Kaffe is a kinda big project to jump in 
> the middle of, but if someone could give me a little direction, I'd be 
> glad to work on some stuff in my spare time.

I don't know much about the status of the Alpha port - I don't think
anybody is currently working very hard on it at the moment (at least, I
haven't seen too many patches lately).

If it's failing regression tests, that's probably where you want to
start.  Try to isolate where the problems are occuring.  eg. Build a
kaffe that works on x86, and one that doesn't on Alpha, and turn up the
verbose options to see where they diverge.  Then try using gdb or
printf's to zoom in even further.  You'll probably have to do some
reading to try to understand what the bits are supposed to be doing, and
then try to figure out where they are going wrong (unfortunately, our
docs are currently a bit weak).  It can get really icky if it involves
toolchain/compiler issues (but it's definitely interesting if you like
puzzles).

> > It's interesting that the jit worked for you.  Possibly it's a toolchain
> > difference or something?
> 
> Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't make that very clear.  My jit3 test was equally 
> bad as your's, but my "intrp" tests were worse than your's with "83 of 
> 114 tests failed".  Yes, I do have a different tool chain, gcc 3.1 here.

Okay.  Possibly it might have something to do with the compiler
re-ordering the symbols (see the "-O4 jit3 problem" thread from the last
few months).
 
> > If you have any patches, we'd love to take a look.  Otherwise, just
> > testing the releases is invaluable.
> 
> No patches yet.  I'll keep testing though.

Good luck.

Cheers,

 - Jim