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<muurkha>unbootstrapping B with C: https://github.com/aap/b/blob/master/riscv64/xx

<stikonas>is somebody still using B?

<stikonas>fossy: I'm almost done with /after -> /sysa renaming, after that we can start removing some stuff from rootfs.py

<stikonas>and as part of that change, I'm adding automatic checksum generation

<stikonas>(actually checksums from the moment bash is built but that's still much bettere than before)

<muurkha>not still, no

<oriansj>muurkha: I think that would more be classified as rebootstrapping

<muurkha>well, I mean it's "unbootstrapping" in the sense that it gives you a way to compile the B compiler without first having a B compiler to compile it with, what the recent Camlboot paper called "debootstrapping"

<muurkha>unfortunately "debootstrap" is the name of Debian's bootstrapping tool

<oriansj>muurkha: well it has a B compiler written in C in that repo

<muurkha>exactly

<oriansj>and a B Compiler written in B that can be built by the C version

<muurkha>right, which after that can bootstrap itself

<oriansj>So it is a valid bootstrap path (the 12th for the B language I have seen)

<muurkha>yes

<muurkha>but I think using the same term to mean "compile a compiler with itself" and "compile a compiler with something else" is confusing, which is presumably why the Camlboot folks chose "debootstrapping"

<muurkha>I think "compile a compiler with itself" is the standard meaning of "bootstrap [a compiler]"

<vagrantc>well, the pull yourself up by your bootstraps idiom is basically ... starting from an impossible point make something out of almost nothing

<vagrantc>though, most people don't have bootstraps anymore, so the anaology falls a little dead

<muurkha>yup, people often cite the Baron von Munchausen's braid

<muurkha>but specifically you're pulling *yourself* up by the bootstraps, not someone else

<muurkha>we could also call unbootstrapping (building a bootstrap-free path to being able to bootstrap) "dominoing", as per the illustration on the Wiki

<unmatched-paren>so, for camlboot, was the goal only to boot ocaml 4.07? because the paper says it can do 4.07 with no mention of getting further, and the repo is abandoned

<unmatched-paren>i guess we'll need to find a bootstrap chain for the rest of the versions?

<unmatched-paren>oh, yes, the paper mentions it

IRC channel logs

2022-04-07.log