Choosing the correct compiler version

[jfondren]

On Tuesday, 19 July 2022 at 15:33:59 UTC, Alexander Zhirov wrote:
> On Tuesday, 19 July 2022 at 15:28:44 UTC, Alexander Zhirov 
> wrote:
>> I'm trying to install dmd with my hands in order to build ldc2 
>> from the sources, but I can't:
>
> I need to build a compiler under x32 in order to compile a 
> program for the same machine.
>
> ```sh
> dmd2/src/dmd# make -f posix.mak
> posix.mak:42: ===== DEPRECATION NOTICE =====
> posix.mak:43: ===== DEPRECATION: posix.mak is deprecated. 
> Please use src/build.d instead.
> posix.mak:44: ==============================
> dmd -of../generated/build -g build.d
> dmd: /lib/libc.so.6: version `GLIBC_2.28' not found (required 
> by dmd)
> posix.mak:111: recipe for target '../generated/build' failed
> make: *** [../generated/build] Error 1
> ```

You can find the release archive linked from 
https://dlang.org/download.html , after clicking 'Download' by 
dmd. It's at http://downloads.dlang.org/

You can then go through old versions and, by trial, find one 
that's old enough to work on your machine, which you can then use 
to a newer dmd:

for x in dmd druntime phobos; do git clone 
https://github.com/dlang/$x; done
export HOST_DMD=path/to/bin32/dmd
( cd dmd; make -f posix.mak ) # etc.

Finding an old version that works on your machine will be very 
easy, but for example the random 2016 build that I grabbed was 
also too old to build dmd master, so you want to prefer a newer 
build that still works. It's not necessary to build dmd master 
though: in the worst case, you should be able check out interim 
releases (look at 'git tag --list', then 'git checkout v2.094.0' 
for example), build those, then used them to build a newer 
release.

This is all of course a massive PITA, which any extremely nice 
person could make less of a pain by cataloguing useful versions 
on the D wiki or by providing their own "good enough to compile 
master" builds for old architectures. Another option is to get 
newer glibc onto this system (not installing it, just making it 
available for dmd. use LD_LIBRARY_PATH).

An option that's technically possible but probably even more of a 
pain than what I've just described is using another machine to 
cross-compile static 32-bit D binaries that will then work on 
this machine. I've tried this and run into pretty unpleasant 
limitations, but I have a guide anyway at 
https://d.minimaltype.com/index.cgi/wiki?name=statically-linked+binaries , which you can supplement with https://wiki.dlang.org/Cross-compiling_with_LDC to get a 32-bit result. For that matter 'ldc2 -mtriple i686-linux-musl file.d' might be made to work, but I've no idea how to supply the toolchains that it expects.

Speaking of toolchains, it might be possible to use a modern 
server with a modern dmd with an ancient glibc: 
https://www.lordaro.co.uk/posts/2018-08-26-compiling-glibc.html