[fpc-devel] Announcement: Free Pascal CompilerDelphi XEPortProject (type override idea)

[Hans-Peter Diettrich]

Skybuck Flying schrieb:

>> Before looking at your code, I'd know the role that your project plays 
>> at all. Is it only about making the FPC code compilable by Delphi, as 
>> the first stage in the FPC bootstrap?
> 
> Yes.

Okay, so far.


> 3. Once the RTL is compiled use the original RTL sources and/or RTL 
> binaries to recompile the free pascal compiler so it's fully 
> self-hosting and self-compiling.

This can be accomplished already, without any modifications to the FPC 
code, by using FPC instead of an Delphi compiler.


> The whole idea is to not require FPC to do any development, all 
> development done on/in Delphi IDE and then final stage compile with FPC 
> for non-supported-delphi-platforms.

Development can be done in whatever IDE you like. This is absolutely 
independent from the compilation and linking of the developed code.

When you want to use FPC as an alternative compiler for Delphi, then 
you'll have to make it output binaries in a way that the Delphi linker 
can use. In order to make use of further targets, as already supported 
by FPC but not by Delphi, you'll have to update the Delphi RTL 
accordingly, and you must add linkers, debuggers etc. for all these 
targets. Here the Delphi license gets into the way, so that you'll have 
to implement a new Delphi-compatible RTL from scratch.

This suggests to me that your approach means much work without any 
practical use, you better create that RTL first, so that it can be used 
already in the compilation of FPC itself.

DoDi