Does gix support gnucobol 3.2?

[Smitty2018]

There was a "3.2 preview" release, will gix work with this version or only with the 3.1.2 version?

[mridoni]

This still has not been tested (I will do it as soon as I can) but in case it doesn’t work, it will probably just require some minor adjustment. The goal is supporting new versions of GnuCOBOL in the long run, it’s just that I needed a stable target and 3.1.2, that’s been stable for some time, and incorporated some features I needed for the debugger support to work, was the logical choice.

[mridoni]

BTW (feedback on this would be appreciated): I am thinking of providing the compiler binaries (the same ones I am buiding here on GitHub) outside of the Windows installer, which will optionally download the packages (obviously with the adequate signature checking). This would provide for faster turnaround times when building the packages and will make it easier to provide updated versions of GnuCOBOL. The counter-argument is that an Internet connection would be needed to install GnuCOBOL, unless the user installs and configures it manually in Gix-IDE. All of this is somewhat irrelevant on Linux, where GnuCOBOL is often installed manually anyway, from source or from a distribution-provided package.

[GitMensch]

I am thinking of providing the compiler binaries (the same ones I am buiding here on GitHub) outside of the Windows installer, which will optionally download the packages (obviously with the adequate signature checking).

This sounds very useful :-)

The counter-argument is that an Internet connection would be needed to install GnuCOBOL, unless the user installs and configures it manually in Gix-IDE.

The installer could have an option to use a pre-downloaded installer msi/exe instead of accessing the internet.

For the configuration part: if it as easy as it was in OCIDE - just point to the directory or the cobc.exe and the IDE pre-sets everything according to some defined layout then runs cobc --verbose --info and cobcrun --verbose --info with these settings to verify it works; then manual configuration is no problem.

[GitMensch]

I think the installer is adjusted now, so the missing pieces are "only":

• provide newer binaries (related: Provide 3.2-rc1 packages gnucobol-binaries#4)
• verify that Gix in general (I see no problems in that or with GixSQL) and the debugger (that should at least be tested) works with GC 3.2

[mridoni]

Packages for GnuCOBOL v3.2rc1 are now available, but Gix-IDE needs a hotfix to be able to use them, I will try to provide one as soon as I can (and no, also installing the compiler manually does not work for the moment). (see below)

[GitMensch]

Now you've got me, why is a hotfix needed?

[mridoni]

Now you've got me, why is a hotfix needed?

I found a problem when parsing the version string in the IDE, but I am thinking this might be a false positive. If it is confirmed to be, I will just remove the note I have added to the packages release page and add a clarification here.

[mridoni]

I can confirm that the 3.2rc1 packages do work with Gix-IDE v1.1.1 (latest stable release), including the debugger. As soon as possible I will add them to the "index" file in the repository and make them available to the Gix-IDE installer. In the meantime you can download the package, uncompress it and manually configure the compiler in the IDE (from Settings -> GnuCOBOL -> Add compiler...)

Sorry for the confusion...

[RobinHulk]

This still has not been tested (I will do it as soon as I can) but in case it doesn’t work, it will probably just require some minor adjustment. The goal is supporting new versions of GnuCOBOL in the long run, it’s just that I needed a stable target and 3.1.2, that’s been stable for some time, and incorporated some features I needed for the debugger support to work, was the logical choice.

What cobol versions does it support?