Subject: Re: [PATCH 0/1] Add a test balloon for C99

From: Junio C Hamano <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2021 11:02:08 -0800

"brian m. carlson" <[email-masked]> writes:

> On 2021-11-15 at 07:00:25, Junio C Hamano wrote:
>> "brian m. carlson" <[email-masked]> writes:
>> 
>> > Even for users who would like to target an older version of Windows,
>> > such as the no longer supported Windows 7, GCC and Clang are available.
>> > The LLVM suite, including Clang, is available pre-compiled for download
>> > free of charge.  Using a different compiler is specifically proposed by
>> > Microsoft staff[1] as a solution for users who wish to build modern
>> > programs for MSVC versions which do not support modern C.
>> >
>> > As such, we can assume that Git can be safely compiled with C99 or C11
>> > support on all operating systems which receive security support, and
>> > even some which do not.  Our CI confirms that this series passes all
>> > tests.  Let's introduce a test balloon which checks for this support and
>> > fails with an error message if it is absent.
>> 
>> I do not have much against adopting nicer C99 language features in
>> principle, but I hope that we are not becoming too Linux centric
>> with "other than Linux, as long as Windows is OK in some form,
>> everything is peachy" mentality.
>
> It's definitely not my goal to exclude Windows here.  I'm pretty sure
> every major Unix platform will handle this fine, and an up to date
> MSVC will also handle this fine.
>
> Because compiling Git for Windows is a lot of work (not due to any
> failing of that project or its members, just the fact that it requires a
> lot of components to be assembled, including a full POSIX environment),
> it's not very likely we're going to see a lot of people doing it, since
> almost all Windows users are going to be using the regular releases.
> It's also likely that they're going to be using some automated CI system
> which will likely support a recent version of the compiler.
>
> However, we have in the past heard screaming from people who want to
> support old versions of Windows, so my point here is that there are
> options if they can't use MSVC for any reason and those options are
> easy, accessible, and free of charge.  I should point out that we
> already require people on non-Linux Unix systems to install GNU make and
> possibly also a shell (if theirs doesn't support the local keyword), so
> installing suitable tooling to build Git isn't without precedent.

Windows does not need me to worry about them---they can fend for
themselves.  I cannot tell if the original discussion behind the
patch considered the current situation in non-mac BSD land (which I
am not familiar with), or even less common platforms like NonStop.