GCC 4.3: common build failures

<p>

Even though GCC 4.2 has seen many delays and still hasn't been released
(although it's finally getting close), a lot of development has already
been done on trunk for the release of GCC 4.3.  I started testing 4.3 in
March and in addition to finding and reporting compiler issues I have <a
href =
"http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?tag=ftbfs-gcc-4.3;users=tbm%40cyrius.com">filed
bugs</a> on packages that fail to build with GCC 4.3.  The idea is to give
people an advance warning and to be ready for GCC 4.3 when it will be
released.

</p>

<p>

We have almost 500 bugs related to GCC 4.3 already, mostly due to a clean-up
of C++ headers in GCC that has exposed sloppy programming in many programs.
Fortunately, these bugs are easy to fix.  As I'm finding common mistakes in
packages, I will document these problems and way to make sure a program is
ready for GCC 4.3.

</p>

<h3>Common problems</h3>

<ul>

<li><a href =
"http://www.cyrius.com/journal/gcc/gcc-4.3-include">Missing
#include</a> directives</li>

<li><a href =
"http://www.cyrius.com/journal/gcc/gcc-4.3-multiple-params">
Duplicate parameters in function prototypes</a></li>

</ul>

<p>

<b>Update:</b> there is now a <a href =
"http://gcc.gnu.org/gcc-4.3/porting_to.html">GCC 4.3 porting guide</a> that
describes the most common problems people will face when moving to GCC 4.3.

</p>

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