Hosting SBCL builds with ABCL (was Re: java.lang.VerifyError with PROGN)

[Mark Evenson]

> On Dec 14, 2019, at 10:43, Eric Marsden <eric.marsden at free.fr> wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> Compiling the loading the code below (a simplified extract of SBCL's
> codebase, found attempting to crossbuild SBCL with ABCL) results in a
> VerifyError, possibly related to the implementation of PROGN. Using
> 1.6.1-dev-svn-15217.
> 

Thanks for the report.  I agree that it looks like a problem with ABCL.

Way back in 2009 while working towards releasing ABCL-1.0.0 as the first ANSI
conformant release of the Bear, fixing ABCL to host a build of SBCL was quite
helpful in shaking out errors in ABCL.  And it also was helpful in finding
problems with SBCL as sometimes the fault lay in their stars.

In attending [the SBCL workshop last week][sbcl20], I intended to see what the
Bear’s current status was in hosting a contemporary SBCL build.

[sbcl20]: http://www.sbcl.org/sbcl20/

(Un)fortunately, I spent most of my time at SBCL20 learning about what others
were doing in Common Lisp, especially taking advantage of the proximity of Zach
(Quicklisp), Luis (SLIME), and Christophe (SBCL) to frame larger questions of
the open CL implementation that ABCL finds itself within as we go into 2020.

Consequently, I never got beyond the new (to me) SBCL `make.sh` facade failing
to create a configuration.

I’m stuck at trying to host SBCL with ABCL via

   bash -x make.sh --xc-host="$HOME/work/abcl/abcl —batch”

ends in the lack of SBCL features being generated:

   gmake: Entering directory '/usr/home/mevenson/work/sbcl/src/runtime'                 
   GNUmakefile:42: genesis/Makefile.features: No such file or directory                 
   gmake: *** No rule to make target 'genesis/Makefile.features'.  Stop.                
   gmake: Leaving directory '/usr/home/mevenson/work/sbcl/src/runtime’         

I’ve started to poke around in the build system by manually invoking each step,
but haven’t found out why an ABCL-hosted compile is not generating the default
SBCL features.  Mebbe the interwebs can help a Bear our here, or I’ll
eventually figure it out for myself.

-- 
"A screaming comes across the sky.  It has happened before but there is nothing 
to compare to it now."