"When it comes to the run-time performance of the compiled programs, GCC previously outperformed LLVM by about 10% on average. Newer results do indicate, however, that LLVM has now caught up with GCC in this area, and is now compiling binaries of approximately equal performance, except for programs using OpenMP"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L...

The development state of the various language front ends is irrelevant. Their existence proves the point that llvm is not specific to c or c-derived languages.

Actually the fanboi in this conversation is the person getting all emotional. You might want to re-evaluate who that is. I'm just a person who thinks the option to use gcc **or** an llvm based compiler would be nice. No one is saying gcc should be replaced, you need not get all emotional and defensive. I often like to use different compilers, especially different architecture targets, as a way to shake bugs out of code.

The separatists only declared an exclusion zone up to 30,000 feet. The plane was well above that. The separatists thereby acknowledged and agreed that everything in the air was not hostile.

That probably depends upon whether you consider the terms of use of the online service, grocery store loyalty card, casino player's card, etc to be transparent. Those terms of use that no one reads.

There is also consent by action. The casino does A/B testing by offering some a $40 steak dinner plus $40 in chips while it offers others $80 in chips. You clicked on the advertisement/offer, or you opened the envelope that arrived in your postal mail, etc.

Similarly the coupons a grocery store offers you are often part of an experiment. Hell, changing the items on the isle end caps are sometimes part of an experiment.

My marketing processor thought that grocery store loyalty cards were the greatest invention ever in the history of marketing. The data collected and opportunity for experiments enormous.

That's not the compiler, and that doesn't happen with bsd licensed tools/libs.

I bet he can't tell them apart either, but I also bet he wouldn't fire a missile at it. *Firing a missile anyway* is the important thing here, not a failure to identify the aircraft.

"Originally implemented for C and C++, the language-agnostic design (and the success) of LLVM has since spawned a wide variety of front ends: languages with compilers that use LLVM include ActionScript, Ada, D, Fortran, OpenGL Shading Language, Haskell, Java bytecode, Julia, Objective-C, Swift, Python, Ruby, Rust, Scala, and C#."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L...

Then your politics is blinding you. Having two unrelated compilers build your code is sometimes helpful in finding bugs in your code. Bug free is goal #1. Being slightly faster is an important but secondary consideration. As I said, it would be nice to have the option to compile with *either* gcc or llvm. Again, note "either", only your politics is creating the straw man of llvm replacing gcc.

Plus one compiler being faster than another is not a given, things change over time

No, Linus did the right thing. "Or later" is very dangerous, its a blank check, its an unknown, ... its a trap! We have no idea what some future GPL license may include. It may include things that we do not want. As some developers who are staying with gpl 2 intentionally have said about gpl 3.

That said, the above is off topic. Compiling the kernel with llvm does not change the license of the kernel. A BSD licensed compiler has no effect on GPL licensed source code. The resulting binary derives its license from its source, not the compiler used.

Compiling with a BSD licensed compiler does not change the license of the software being compiled. Linux would remain gpl regardless of whether gcc or llvm is used.

For exploration, for technology development. Some things are too big, too risky or the return on investment too long for commercial space companies.

Contrary to some of its critics beliefs, some NASA spending does have a return on investment, a benefit to the U.S. economy and U.S. society. Much like some investments in basic scientific research. The problem is that some politicians are just like wall street, they want to see the payback in a fiscal quarter or two -- well unless their district provides something to NASA. Sometimes budget cuts are a politician's way of saying "I didn't get my piece of the pie".

And using cuts in temporary wartime spending to "pay for" new permanent spending, and calling the new spending "deficit neutral" since its "paid for". Political math is amazing.

That should have been "being able". One day I will have to start proofreading.

Or upgrade to llvm. Being above to compile with either gcc or llvm would be a nice option.

If we get more CS majors then maybe we can update the voice recognition software to do a better job of picking between phonetically similar words using context.