Most people want cgo support to be available. That means you need a C
compiler, and shouldn't be a surprise to anyone.

I don't see the problem with saying "If you don't have or want a C compiler
then disable cgo."

On 7 May 2015 at 10:09, Dave Cheney notifications@github.com wrote:

Building Go on a fresh linux/arm64 machine fails because gcc is not
installed.

This might be confusing to new developers because we've made a lot of
noise that we're moving away from C to Go in the 1.5 release.

The gcc build time dependency comes from cgo, and all linux/* platforms
default to cgo enabled by default.

Should cmd/dist check to see if gcc (or $CC) is valid, and if not, disable
cgo ?

/cc @adg https://github.com/adg @minux https://github.com/minux

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#10731.

Fair point. Currently the build pukes in the middle of the second stage compile. Do you have strong feelings on adding a check to cmd/dist that if cgo is enabled and gcc/$CC is not found, to abort earlier ?

It sounds like a nice user friendly thing to do.

On 7 May 2015 at 10:25, Dave Cheney notifications@github.com wrote:

Fair point. Currently the build pukes in the middle of the second stage
compile. Do you have strong feelings on adding a check to cmd/dist that if
cgo is enabled and gcc/$CC is not found, to abort earlier ?

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#10731 (comment).

This actually bit me today while setting up new builders. I agree we should fail earlier, and be helpful when failing would be nice.

CL https://golang.org/cl/12146 mentions this issue.