On 25 March 2012 01:34, Daniel Green <venix1@gmail.com> wrote:
First, I want apologize.  For the lack of a responses lately and because I didn't include installation instructions in the latest release notices, but they are still included in the readme that comes in every release.

Second, I'd like to offer some background on why I chose the method of distribution I did.

For a long time, GDC2 on Windows didn't work.  That combined with the constant work being done on GDC, I wanted to package only the minimal number of files necessary.  Since I'm using exactly the same arguments(scripts really) as was used to compile TDM, it made it simple enough to drop in the GDC bits.

That allowed the rapid updating to newer versions of GDC by extracting into TDM-GCC again.  Very useful when needing to test in an unpolluted environment.

Starting with the first working release that supported TLS back in January, things got complicated.  Currently, there is a patch for GCC, binutils, and the MinGW runtime required to support TLS.  The GCC patch makes TLS incompatible between D and any other language.  The binutils only adds new functionality and fixes a bug.  The MinGW runtime files can really break things, because I also had to update to a newer version.  This was something I did note in the last release.

I have submitted the binutils and runtime patches but haven't heard much.  The GCC patch needs cleaning up before I'm willing to submit it.

I also deliberately wanted the install to be done with a zip file to keep away the faint of heart.  GDC/MinGW contained many bugs and I wanted it to be known it wasn't ready for use.  Additionally, it also allows rapid updating to more recent builds.  Now that GDC is current with DMD the need for rapid releases has disappeared and it may be possible to release quasi-stable binaries.

I'm going to update GDC/MinGW to tip and release a new zip file.  If there are no serious issues and Iain agrees, I'll consider doing a beta release and making an installer.  Mostly it depends on if I feel that the release can be usable long term.  I really have no interest in maintaining a fourth MinGW installer(mingw, mingw-w64, TDM).

Best Regards,

Daniel Green

Cheers for the info. Here's hoping the release works out well.
What instabilities are you primarily concerned about with the existing release? I've been using it for a couple of weeks, and had no problems. Are there particular things you anticipate causing issues?