Subject: Re: [bug#69552] [PATCH vREVISION 1/2] gnu: Add cyclone-bootstrap.

From: Christopher Baines <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2024 14:42:52 +0000

TakeV <[email-masked]> writes:

> I think I am a bit confused. Are you saying that we need to be able to
> generate the file ourselves from scratch, rather than using the
> upstream source code?
>
> Or do you mean that we package the first version of the bootstrap
> compiler which is not automatically generated, then use the result to
> generate the cyclone binary, then use that to generate the bootstrap
> compiler, and so forth until we are at the latest version?

I don't have a solution to suggest unfortunately, I'm just raising this
as a problem.

Either of the approaches you suggest above would work.

> Mostly uncertain because the self-hosted compiler does generate the
> bootstrap compiler's source, but it is not needed to build the
> bootstrap compiler itself, and thus seems to be the same approach as
> guile aside from how the source code being written by a person vs a
> computer.

It's the "how the source code being written by a person vs a computer"
bit that's key, source code generated by a computer isn't the preferred
form for editing, so building from it is not building from source, even
though it's source code.