Heads up, g++ in Xcode 5 points to Clang

[Joakim]

On Monday, 28 October 2013 at 18:34:11 UTC, Joseph Rushton 
Wakeling wrote:
> On 28/10/13 18:33, Joakim wrote:
>> Do you have any evidence that they've exerted "proprietary 
>> control" over llvm,
>> say by adding closed modules to their compiler?
>
> I understand how you could interpret it that way, but my email 
> didn't actually suggest that Apple had any plans to 
> close-source the compiler.
No, I got it, I knew you said they'd be "able to exert 
proprietary control," not that they'd done it.  I was just 
wondering if you had evidence that they actually had done any of 
that already, since I don't follow llvm closely.

It is a valid concern, as Google has been closing up a bunch of 
their initially Apache-licensed Android apps:

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/10/googles-iron-grip-on-android-controlling-open-source-by-any-means-necessary/

But the source is still out there for the older versions, and 
these companies don't have any responsibility to keep giving 
their work away for free.

> My impression -- and I'm happy to be proven wrong -- is that 
> Apple disliked the idea of a GPLv3-licensed compiler because 
> its patent grants might have created problems for other parts 
> of their software portfolio, which indeed _are_ proprietary.
Yeah, the GPLv3 is why Apple and FreeBSD stopped updating to the 
latest gcc after 4.2.1, which was the last GPLv2 release.  OS X 
10.8 and iOS 6 were completely built by clang and FreeBSD 10, the 
next major release, is making clang the default compiler.  I 
don't know if it's because of patent grants or other aspects of 
GPLv3.

>> While I do not buy Apple products because of their odious 
>> patent stance, I
>> highly doubt they would ever use such compiler patents, if 
>> they even have any.
>> Microsoft has a patent on continually scanning a document for 
>> spelling errors
>> and highlighting them 
>> (http://www.google.com/patents/US5787451), yet _as far as
>> we know_ (and according to a former Microsoft employee -
>> http://keithcu.com/wordpress/?page_id=1548), they've never 
>> asserted it on the
>> dozens of applications with such spell-checking in their text 
>> editing controls,
>> including this Chrome browser tab I'm currently typing into.
>
> I think we've all seen enough software history to know that 
> "highly unlikely" is not the same as "won't happen". :-)
Valid point.

>> I agree that it is a problem that Apple doesn't do a patent 
>> grant for their open
>> source projects, assuming they even have any compiler or other 
>> software patents
>> on them, but I'm skeptical they'd ever enforce those anyway.  
>> Also, IANAL, but I
>> believe they'd never be able to extract any money from such a 
>> lawsuit anyway,
>> since they don't make any money from clang or Safari and give 
>> them away for free.
>
> I doubt they'd try to use their patents to extract money from 
> anyone, but I could see them using them to put a competitor out 
> of business.  If (say) Firefox OS or Ubuntu Touch become 
> significant forces in the mobile/tablet market, I wouldn't put 
> it past any of the traditional mobile players to pull out their 
> patent portfolios to try and damage them.
How do they put them out of business if they don't get money out 
of them?  They could stop them from using that patented 
functionality, but you can usually design around such patents, 
unless they're overly broad, so it's a small hindrance, not 
really going to put you out of business.  Of course, "traditional 
mobile players" are a different issue, as they actually make 
money by selling the features they're patenting.

On Monday, 28 October 2013 at 17:45:39 UTC, Jacob Carlborg wrote:
> On 2013-10-28 18:33, Joakim wrote:
>
>> I actually talked to the head llvm guy at Apple about this 
>> possibility a
>> couple years back and he was adamantly against anyone outside 
>> closing up
>> parts of the compiler.  Of course, he may not get to make that 
>> decision
>> at Apple and we can't know the truth unless we peek at the 
>> source for
>> the shipping compiler at Apple, but I haven't seen any 
>> evidence that
>> llvm isn't developed in the open.
>>
>> Have you?
>
> No, but LLVM shipped by Apple might not be the same LLVM you 
> can access the source code to.
Yep, that's why I mentioned that "we can't know the truth unless 
we peek at the source for the shipping compiler at Apple." :)

On Monday, 28 October 2013 at 19:02:35 UTC, Iain Buclaw wrote:
> On 28 October 2013 18:38, Joseph Rushton Wakeling
> <joseph.wakeling at webdrake.net> wrote:
>> It certainly seems to be true that LLVM is moving faster 
>> innovation-wise.  I
>> don't know how much of that is down to any architectural 
>> advantages, how
>> much might be because they support less targets and so have a 
>> lower
>> maintenance burden, and how much of it is just the scale of 
>> resources being
>> put into it.
>>
>
> I don't see it that way.  Up until now at least I haven't seen
> anything they do that wasn't already do-able in GCC.  They just 
> do a
> better job at PR (which is what you expect from Apple anyway).
Really?  The claims that llvm has a cleaner codebase, is easier 
to use because it's all properly split up into different 
libraries, and introduces new features like better error 
reporting: that's all "PR?"