STM32 ARM toolset advice?

> CBFalconer wrote:
>
> > Chris has a simple and infallible mechanism.  Open-source = bad.
> > Expensive = good.
>
> P.J.Pauger has often said he can't afford open source.
>
> My direct experience with FOSS compilers
>
> 1) Optimization standards and metrics reflect several years old
> technology. Depending on target a considerable difference.
>
> 2) The source level debug information generated in most FOSS compilers
>
> did not reflect the optimization choices the compiler made in code
> generation
>
> 3) With a single exception none of the FOSS systems I have looked at
> even attempted to incorporate silicon errata into the code generators
> something we have been doing in our commercial compilers for a decade
> and a half.
>
> You may actually get what you are paying for.
>
> Regards,
>
> --
> Walter Banks
> Byte Craft Limited
> http://www.bytecraft.com
>
>
>

>Paul Black wrote:
>
>Chris has a simple and infallible mechanism.  Open-source = bad. 
>Expensive = good.
>

Open-source is not free, even if it is often suggested that it is.  When I
find a compiler issue I report it to the vender I pay maintenance to and
within a few days their engineers have fixed the problem, and our projects
are back on track.  Since I am delivering commercial software to date and
to budget that is essential, over runs of effort or timescale cost money
– big money.  But yes I pay a yearly maintenance contract for it.  Yes it
would be nice not to pay but I also pay insurance on my car, which I was
glad of when someone drove into the side of my car recently – no hassle
– no cost to me, just let the insurance company fix it, and have a
curtsey car whiule mine is repaired.  (I wonder do you insure your car or
do you prefer a “free” alternative?)

If on the other hand I have to rely on my engineers trawling the internet,
and then diving into the innards of open source software to fix a compiler
issue, that is not free, not remotely free.  It actually costs me about
£70 an hour in labour charges, (wages, national insurance, taxes, pensions
etc).   We write embedded software we are not compiler experts, even if one
of our developers would love to play writing his own compiler .  

While the engineer is doing all that he is not writing the code our
customers pay us for.  So a single issue with the compiler could costs us
many £1,000s and could even risk us losing customers and future business. 
If we lose a major customer because we are late while fixing problems in
“free” open source and poorly supported tools people will lose their
jobs.   

Now imagine that it is you who loses their job, because we decided to use
a “free” open source tool instead of a fully supported and commercial
tool. - I wonder would you thank me for using open source tools when you
lost your job, would you be pleased you lost the job, would you still think
open source is free, or would you tell everyone you met how unhappy you are
that you lost your job and had to sell your house because your employer was
a cheap skate and didn’t invest in commercial well supported tools.

I recently abandoned the idea of using linux because I was horrified at
how much using linux on a new project was going to cost.  It was far
cheaper to use WinCE.  I am sure if I paid you the saving we made by not
using open source software you would be delighted.  In fact you could
afford to buy a lot of “expensive” tools.

Bocote

Bocote <PBlake@eden-electronics.co.uk> wrote:
>>Paul Black wrote:
>>
>>Chris has a simple and infallible mechanism.  Open-source = bad. 
>>Expensive = good.
> Open-source is not free, even if it is often suggested that it is.

Indeed. There is no shortage of vendors willing to sell you the support
you want for most open-source products, including Linux and GCC. That
way you get the comfort of having someone to yell at, *and* the
advantage of being able to examine how things really work if you need to
or want to. I don't understand why this is always seen as an either-or
proposition when you can have both.

-Anders

In message <48EFC70D.C9457295@yahoo.com>, CBFalconer 
<cbfalconer@yahoo.com> writes
>Paul Black wrote:
>> Chris H wrote:
>?
>>>> Have you used any of them?
>>>
>>> Not personally.
>>>
>>>> Which was the best?
>>>
>>> No idea.
>>>
>>>> Do they have good debugging support?
>>>
>>> Not compared to commercial tools
>>
>> How on earth can you state that conclusion based on no experience
>> and no idea?
>
>Chris has a simple and infallible mechanism.  Open-source = bad

That I have found generally the case.

>Expensive = good.

No.
However some open source is very expensive  (see other email in this 
thread from Eden

Some closed source is very good and FREE

You seem to have the stupid idea that all closed source is expensive and 
all open source is free.


-- 
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
\/\/\/\/\ Chris Hills  Staffs  England     /\/\/\/\/
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

On 2008-10-11, Bocote <PBlake@Eden-Electronics.co.uk> wrote:

>>Chris has a simple and infallible mechanism.  Open-source = bad. 
>>Expensive = good.
>
> Open-source is not free, even if it is often suggested that it
> is.  When I find a compiler issue I report it to the vender I
> pay maintenance to and within a few days their engineers have
> fixed the problem, and our projects are back on track.

The last time I reported a gnu toolchain bug, it was fixed
within a few hours. :)  I've also been ignored by commercial
toolchain vendors when I reported a bug.

> Since I am delivering commercial software to date and to
> budget that is essential, over runs of effort or timescale
> cost money ??? big money.  But yes I pay a yearly maintenance
> contract for it.

You can get commercial support for open-source if you want.


-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow! INSIDE, I have the
                                  at               same personality disorder
                               visi.com            as LUCY RICARDO!!

In message <gcqjt5$h1n$1@aioe.org>, 
Anders.Montonen@kapsi.spam.stop.fi.invalid writes
>Bocote <PBlake@eden-electronics.co.uk> wrote:
>>>Paul Black wrote:
>>>
>>>Chris has a simple and infallible mechanism.  Open-source = bad.
>>>Expensive = good.
>> Open-source is not free, even if it is often suggested that it is.
>
>Indeed. There is no shortage of vendors willing to sell you the support
>you want for most open-source products, including Linux and GCC. That
>way you get the comfort of having someone to yell at, *and* the
>advantage of being able to examine how things really work if you need to
>or want to. I don't understand why this is always seen as an either-or
>proposition when you can have both.
>-Anders

Having been doing tech support for may years I can tell you that giving 
most programers the source to fix a compiler is not a good idea. Most 
don't understand compilers. They also go on about "ANSI-C" !!!

The other disadvantage is that it is old technology and is not as good 
at is primary purpose and the commercial tools.



-- 
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
\/\/\/\/\ Chris Hills  Staffs  England     /\/\/\/\/
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

In message <TcCdnUe6NbbdQm3VnZ2dnUVZ_rjinZ2d@posted.visi>, Grant Edwards 
<grante@visi.com> writes
>On 2008-10-11, Bocote <PBlake@Eden-Electronics.co.uk> wrote:
>
>>>Chris has a simple and infallible mechanism.  Open-source = bad.
>>>Expensive = good.
>>
>> Open-source is not free, even if it is often suggested that it
>> is.  When I find a compiler issue I report it to the vender I
>> pay maintenance to and within a few days their engineers have
>> fixed the problem, and our projects are back on track.
>
>The last time I reported a gnu toolchain bug, it was fixed
>within a few hours. :)  I've also been ignored by commercial
>toolchain vendors when I reported a bug.

Perhaps it is your approach. :-)

>
>> Since I am delivering commercial software to date and to
>> budget that is essential, over runs of effort or timescale
>> cost money ??? big money.  But yes I pay a yearly maintenance
>> contract for it.
>
>You can get commercial support for open-source if you want.

So they are not free.. Where is the advantage?

-- 
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
\/\/\/\/\ Chris Hills  Staffs  England     /\/\/\/\/
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

<Anders.Montonen@kapsi.spam.stop.fi.invalid> wrote in message 
news:gcqjt5$h1n$1@aioe.org...
> Bocote <PBlake@eden-electronics.co.uk> wrote:
>>>Paul Black wrote:
>>>
>>>Chris has a simple and infallible mechanism.  Open-source = bad.
>>>Expensive = good.
>> Open-source is not free, even if it is often suggested that it is.
>
> Indeed. There is no shortage of vendors willing to sell you the support
> you want for most open-source products, including Linux and GCC. That
> way you get the comfort of having someone to yell at, *and* the
> advantage of being able to examine how things really work if you need to
> or want to. I don't understand why this is always seen as an either-or
> proposition when you can have both.
>
> -Anders

This is just the same old arguments that have been put pro and anti open 
source for years.  Some open source code is good and well supported, some 
bad.  Some closed source code is good and well supported, some bad.  Etc, 
etc.  Some open source comes with commercial support, some doesn't.  Blah, 
blah, blah.  As with everything in life generalisations are usually 
misguided.

I wonder how many anti-open source people use Firefox?

-- 
Regards,
Richard.

+ http://www.FreeRTOS.org & http://www.FreeRTOS.org/shop
17 official architecture ports, more than 6000 downloads per month.

+ http://www.SafeRTOS.com
Certified by T&#4294967295;V as meeting the requirements for safety related systems. 

Chris H <chris@phaedsys.org> wrote:
> Having been doing tech support for may years I can tell you that giving 
> most programers the source to fix a compiler is not a good idea.

Usually being able to look and understand the implementation is enough.
For instance, working on OS X having access to the IOKit sources has
saved my bacon several times - either by clarifying vague or incomplete
documentation, or by being able to show that some particularly tricky
bug was in the operating system and helping us implement a workaround
until the vendor released a fix. 

> The other disadvantage is that it is old technology and is not as good 
> at is primary purpose and the commercial tools.

There you go again, confusing "commercial" and "open-source". Though I
suspect in your case it's intentional.

-Anders

Chris H wrote:
> In message <TcCdnUe6NbbdQm3VnZ2dnUVZ_rjinZ2d@posted.visi>, Grant Edwards
>> On 2008-10-11, Bocote <PBlake@Eden-Electronics.co.uk> wrote:
>>> Since I am delivering commercial software to date and to
>>> budget that is essential, over runs of effort or timescale
>>> cost money ??? big money.  But yes I pay a yearly maintenance
>>> contract for it.
>>
>> You can get commercial support for open-source if you want.
> 
> So they are not free.. Where is the advantage?

The advantage is (and this is not at all a new argument): if the
commercial vendor tells you "I won't fix this bug, buy our upgrade
instead", "You are using a non-standard product which is not covered by
our support contract", or "We won't fix this problem, implement your own
workaround", that's it. Maybe you can go to court and solve the issue,
so you get a fix six months later. With an open-source tool-chain, you
can always hire someone to do it for you (if you don't want to do it
yourself).

The open-source people will also not ship broken dongle drivers that
crash your development machine, nor will they tell you "of course we
delivered you the CDs and dongles, but we will not give you the license
files until you sign this contract expansion which limits your rights".

None of the above has been made up, everything experienced during my
(still short) life as embedded developer. I would prefer open-source by
far. Actually, aside from the Windows and the toolchain on my
development computer, all programs I use regularly are open-source.
Unfortunately, the GCC for our target is pretty bad.

Maybe my experience also comes from the fact that we're a medium-sized
European company, which doesn't have high priority for glorious American
companies. If we were AT&T or the DoD in the United States, our live
might be easier. That aside, our company policy is to buy source
licenses for everything where we can get them. This has saved our lives,
nay, projects, more than once in a while. If there were a source license
for the compiler, we'd probably get it.

Compulsory car comparison: would you buy a car where the motor block is
cast in concrete, which only the vendor can fix, and only if you buy a
support contract? Or would you buy one which every backyard mechanic (or
you yourself using a self-help book) can fix?


  Stefan