[fpc-devel] Status of ESP8266 embedded target

[Travis Siegel]

On 10/4/2022 1:07 AM, Christo Crause wrote:
>
> On Tue, 4 Oct 2022, 01:15 Travis Siegel via fpc-devel, 
> <fpc-devel at lists.freepascal.org> wrote:
>
>     Does this process use gcc to do the compile, instead of fpc
>     directly? If
>     it does, I will dig into making it compatible with Parallax's line of
>     propeller boards, since it now supports GCC to generate code for the
>     propeller 1 and 2 boards.  Being able to program these in pascal
>     would
>     be wonderful.  Parallax has a series of SBC products, including the
>     basic stamp, a java stamp, (no longer produced), and as mentioned,
>     the
>     propeller boards.  They also have several robot packages that can be
>     programmed via the propeller or basic stamps, so if the esp board
>     code
>     does work, and it calls gcc for it's work, I'll certainly be
>     interested
>     in tackling making it work with the propeller boards, I think that
>     could
>     help some folks start using those boards.
>
>
> The compiler typically generates target CPU specific assembler code, 
> which requires an external assembler and linker to generate the 
> executable code. I don't know much about the Parallax controllers, but 
> it appears to be a distinct architecture (not ARM or MIPS for example) 
> not yet supported by FPC, so would require a new compiler backend AFAIU.


Yeah, it's a custom board, but it has 8 cores, which makes multitasking 
real simple.  They call them cogs, and you can spin up another cog at 
any time.  It also uses a language called spin (their version of 
assembly), so I guess it could be supported, but how much work is adding 
a whole new architecture to FPC?  They do have a version of gcc that 
works for their boards, so I was hoping we could piggyback on that, but 
I guess that would be a GPC thing not FPC, and since gpc requires a 
specific version of GCC to do it's work, and it's not really supported 
anymore as far as I can tell, that would be a nonstarter.

Ok, well, just thought I'd check, I personally would enjoy programming 
in pascal for some of these SBC boards, but I can stick with the 
existing tools as well, they do work, it would be more convenient for me 
if pascal was an option, that's all.

I know a lot of compilers use gcc as their backend, and didn't know if 
fpc did this or not, so figured I'd ask.

Thanks for the info.

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