[Sunhelp] PCI Ethernet card.

[James Lockwood]

On Mon, 15 Nov 1999, Wes Hofmann wrote:

> Hmm.  I'm assuming gcc or egcs isn't going to cut it for compiling a driver,
> right?  Does sun have any sort of a deal where you get a copy of their
> compiler and development environment for a MUCH reduced price if you don't
> intend to use your code commercially?  As a student, paying a few hundred
> dollars for a compiler is a complete impossibility. :(  Thanks for any info!

gcc works fine for compiling drivers if you're careful to avoid any
emitted code that is illegal in the kernel (such as floating point).  It
did have some minor problems with SunOS 4 kernel modules at one point in
time, but not with Solaris 2.

I would stick with a stable and well known release such as 2.8.1.  2.9.x
and egcs in general is too bleeding edge for kernel work.  You really do
not want to be tracking down a compiler bug that ends up crashing the
kernel.

You can download a trial version of Sun's software development suite with
a license that is good for 30 days if you want to check it out.  They
sometimes offer discount licenses for students but I don't believe that
they have any programs currently running. 

-James