Return-Path: smlieu Return-Path: Received: by cygnus.com (4.1/SMI-4.1) id AA27485; Tue, 21 Sep 93 19:02:07 PDT Date: Tue, 21 Sep 93 19:02:07 PDT From: smlieu (Sun Ming Lieu) Message-Id: <9309220202.AA27485@cygnus.com> To: engnews-distrib ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Vol 2 No 9 INSIDE CYGNUS ENGINEERING September 1993 ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Inside Cygnus Engineering (ICE) is published monthly for customers of Cygnus Support. Our objective is to provide a relevant but informal summary of news and ongoing activities. Please send all comments, suggestions, and subscription requests to engnews@cygnus.com. TABLE OF CONTENTS ----------------- . Q3 Update . Improvements to ld . CHILL Update . MIPS R4000 Support . TOC enhancement for RS/6000 . Quarterly Software Updates . Support Contract Renewal Process . Software Maintenance Status . One Cool Company . New DOS Pricing . Customer Forum (Logistics) . Customer Forum Responses (Additional Products) . Hackers Index PRODUCTS AND RELEASES --------------------- 1. Q3 Update We have begun the final builds of the Q3 Progressive Release, and expect to release to production in next week. Update request cards were sent out via US Mail a week ago. These inadvertently said that the software "is available" rather than "will be available shortly". Sorry! We think the production delays of Q2 are now behind us, and expect to begin shipment in the second week of October. NEW AND ONGOING DEVELOPMENTS ---------------------------- We are implementing some of these only for certain platforms, so for the moment, they are not all tested or available for generic use. 1. Improvements to ld A number of users have asked for reduced memory usage of the linker (ld). In the current implementation, all symbols from all input files are read into memory and copied into a larger canonical form. This reduces file I/O at the cost of increased memory usage, so systems with small amounts of available real memory would thrash when used to link large programs. We have started to implement a command line option whereby the user can decide whether to read and keep all symbols in memory, or to read the input files twice. Instead of using memory in proportion to the total number of input symbols and their canonical form, this implementation uses memory in proportion to the total number of global symbols, or the total number of input symbols without a canonical form. While exact memory savings vary with the input, this version of ld typically requires a quarter of the memory in comparison with the original when linking itself. Time savings depend on the input and the system, but some links that were previously impossible on certain systems are now simple to do. We are testing the new version of ld on Sun 3 (m68k) and Sun 4 (sparc) a.out files, and for i386 coff. We expect to convert the other linker ports in the near future. 2. CHILL update The GNU CHILL project has made agreements to share CHILL test suites with two overseas compiler development companies. We have received one test-suite contribution of 187 tests totalling about 300 kbytes, and a second one with 2431 tests for another 3.64 mbytes. Another partner company has also promised to exchange tests. In addition to providing Cygnus' test files, Cygnus will provide a DejaGNU framework for the entire aggregate. We will of course ask these partners to make their contributions freely available. 3. MIPS R4000 Support We have begun work to provide a full 64-bit port of the development toolkit to the MIPS R4000 processor. This will support the elf object file format. We are excited about this port, as many customers have expressed interest in getting support, and because it helps strengthen our MIPS and 64-bit toolkit offerings. We expect beta availability at year end. 4. TOC enhancement for RS/6000 Position independent code and shared libraries on the IBM RS/6000 use a table of contents (TOC) mechanism. This has a maximum of 64k entries, thus limiting the original gcc implementation to 16k variables. We have now introduced a " -mminimal-toc" option. With this option, gcc only emits one TOC entry per module, and indirects through this single TOC entry to access the information it needs, allowing approximately 16K variables per module, and 16K modules. This will benefit developers of large, complex applications, e.g., CAD packages. It is included as part of the Q3 release. SUPPORT ACTIVITIES ------------------- 1. Quarterly Software Updates In the interest of conserving paper and media, we do not automatically send updates to our customers with each quarterly release. Instead, about a month before the end of the quarter, we send out an update request card (via US Mail) to ask you if you would like to get the quarterly Progressive Release. This card also contains contract information such as currently supported platforms, media type, expiration date, etc. It is sent to the designated Technical Contact in your company when the support contract was first set up. In the last month or so, we have received several calls from customers who did not receive the card and therefore the invitation to update software. We are looking at ways to improve this for the next release. Options to improve this process include sending this update notice by email (either instead of, or in addition to the hardcopy version), and accepting a default request to either always receive or always not receive updates. We would appreciate knowing your preferences. (See questions 1 and 2 in the Customer Forum section.) Of course, we continue to rely on your help in letting us know when your technical point of contact changes. 2. Support Contract Renewal Process As we reviewed some of the logistics side of the support effort, another item that caught our attention was the contract renewal process. The most common hiccoughs seem to be surprises when pricing changes and lapses between expiration and renewal. In the latter case, although we usually make every attempt to keep support continuous, sometimes a software update is not sent out during the lapse. We are very concerned about these situations and would like to ask for your help to minimize them. In the case of price changes, these are announced in ICE at least 90 days in advance. However, the readership of ICE tends to be predominantly technical. In the second part of the Customer Forum section, we ask some questions about how to more effectively notify you and your organization of pending changes. 3. Software maintenance status In addition to new development, a significant part of our engineering resources is devoted to answering questions, fixing problems in the GNU software, and providing a range of support services to our customers. The following table shows the maintenance statistics for the last five weeks. We continue to need your help: please let us know when you agree that a problem has been fixed so that we can move it from a "feedback" state to a "closed" state. # # # # # # Date Open Analzd Fdback Closed Suspnd Total ------------------------------------------------------------ 08/16/93 497 235 577 1,699 144 3,152 09/20/93 475 250 606 1,944 145 3,420 ------------------------------------------------------------ Change -22 +15 +29 +245 +1 +268 OTHER ITEMS ----------- 1. One Cool Company Cygnus was featured in an article titled "Fortune Visits 25 Cool Companies" in the Autumn 1993 Special Issue of Fortune Magazine. Defining "cool" to be "Exciting new ideas brought to life... Risk. Breaking the rules and winning. Getting rich without sacrificing humanity. Changing the world... what keeps us awake, what generates buzz. It's what we wish *we'd* done", the article starts off with a photo of the three Cygnus founders meeting in a hot tub, and highlights some of our ideas as well as some of the friendly aspects of daily life at Cygnus. 2. New DOS Pricing We have reduced the price for Single Platform, C-only support contracts for DOS cross hosts. The original price was $5,000 per year for 2 users, and $2,000 per additional user. The new price is $2,500 per year for 2 users and $1,000 per additional user. Combined C and C++ support remains at $7,500 per year for 2 users and $3,000 per additional user. 3. Customer Forum We value your suggestions, and would like your response to the following questions (to engnews@cygnus.com). We will publish summaries of answers of general interest in a future issue. 1. Would you prefer to get the Progressive Release update request form via email instead of through US Mail? 2. Would you prefer to receive quarterly Progressive updates on a case by case basis, or would you prefer to just have a default to receive (or not to receive) all updates? 3. What else can we do to improve the software update service? 4. How would you like us to notify you of changes in support prices? 5. If you are a repeat customer, are you satisfied with the contract renewal process? What would you like us to change or improve? 3. Customer Forum Responses In the August issue of ICE, we asked about what additional language front ends and products you would like us to support. Most respondents were quite satisfied with C and C++, although there was a request for Pascal and one for FORTRAN (especially for the Cray). As for other products, here are relative popularities of the top six of interest: cvs xxxx gcov/gprof xxx simulators xxx make xx class libraries xx browsers/xref xx 4. Hackers Index Number of Cygnus Engineers, September 1992: 16 Number of Cygnus Engineers, September 1993: 32 --------------------------------------------------------------------- Cygnus Support 1937 Landings Drive One Kendall Square Mountain View, CA 94043 Cambridge, MA 02139 +1 415 903 1400 voice +1 617 494 1040 voice +1 415 903 0122 fax +1 617 494 1325 fax ---------------------------------------------------------------------