GNU bug report logs - #43303
GCC package name

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From: Jeffrey Walton <noloader <at> gmail.com>
To: 43303 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: bug#43303: GCC package name
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 2020 01:20:47 -0400

Hi Everyone,

It took me about 15 minutes to install GCC on Guix because Guix named
the GCC package libgccjit.

I understand Guix package manager is powerful. I think you should use
an alias feature (or whatever it is called under Guix), and create and
few aliases to help with administration:

   gcc -> libgccjit
   g++ -> libgccjit
   gcc-c++ -> libgccjit

These are the names developers expect for the compiler. They don't
expect a name like libgccjit.

With the aliases in place, a command like 'guix install gcc' works as expected.

Without the aliases (and absent a sane package name), people have to
lookup the documentation and read how to use the package manager for a
simple task like installing the compiler. When 50 or 100 developers
waste 15 minutes of their time, that's about 1 man-week wasted.
There's no reason to waste man-weeks on simple tasks.

Thanks in advance.

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