RFR: 8031668: (xxs) TOOLCHAIN_FIND_COMPILER unexpectedly resolves symbolic links

[Magnus Ihse Bursie]

On 2014-01-14 02:46, Mike Duigou wrote:
> Hello all;
>
> This is a very small change. Currently when TOOLCHAIN_FIND_COMPILER evaluates a compiler it resolves any symbolic links. This behaviour thwarts compiler setups that use a single executable and multiple symbolic links that "curry" configuration information into the link name.
>
> http://cr.openjdk.java.net/~mduigou/JDK-8031668/0/webrev/

I wrote this in the bug but it's probably better to have a discussion 
here, so I'll repeat it:

Unfortunately, it's not just so simple that we can remove the symbolik 
link resolution. :-(

There's quite a dance going on in TOOLCHAIN_FIND_COMPILER, trying to 
locate a proper compiler in a way that works robust on all systems (that 
we have encountered so far, at least).

That being said, we've also run into the problem you describe before, in 
the AIX port, where the same compiler is either C or C++ depending on 
it's name.

So we have two conflicting goals (resolve and do not resolve) here. :(

I'm not quite sure of the best way forward here.

/Magnus