What are your reasons for preferring clang over gcc?

Clang/LLVM allows a lot of tinkering and compiler software development that is more difficult with gcc.

Clang/LLVM is just an easier platform for code instrumentation, cross compilation, code sanitizers, building your own compiler tool/language, understanding the codebase, good documentation to build your own LLVM based tools...

It's a bonus that any tools/languages etc. you build using the LLVM infrastructure does not virally become GPL also.

Aparently Clang is ~5% faster than GCC (at least on intel's latest chip) -- See https://www.phoronix.com/review/intel-meteorlake-gcc-clang . Though this is not a big deal for me -- it is just nice to know.

GPL is a positive for me. I am not sure if there is an llvm equivalent in gcc that would pose a "risk" anyways if you embark on such a project. I'll look into the instrumentation and llvm stuff, thanks.

We started a separate BSD userland project before Chimera even existed, but we didn't feel the port was up to our standards of quality, so we shelved it. Removing our dependence on GNU software is a definite goal of mine, though it is relatively low priority and likely far off.

Scudo can be faster in some workloads. However, I recall Scudo is woefully underperforming on 32-bit systems (it may not even work?). Replacing the memory allocator is definitely something you can do, but it introduces another variable into the mix, and I personally feel that would also compromise our goal of reliability.

Differences between Alpine also include: NLS enabled everywhere, so translations work and are functional. No use of GNU gettext, only musl's gettext. A focus on providing a more "full" experience to users over optimising for smaller binary sizes. There are more differences obviously. For some uses Alpine would be better, and for some uses Adélie would be better.

Also: that comparison page is on the oldwww. domain, which means it isn't a part of the current site, which is why it hasn't been updated.

> Removing our dependence on GNU software is a definite goal of mine

Why?

Ease of understanding, perhaps. I found musl source code much easier to understand than GNU libc.

Or maybe GNU just rubs people the wrong way?

* GNU tools are often bloated, with extensions that the vast majority of people do not need or want. While we don't have quite the same focus on "must be small binary size" as Alpine, needless waste is still needless waste.

* GNU tools use gnulib, which is frequently incompatible with musl, and is a moving target for both building packages and passing tests. The number of patches I've personally had to write to make gnulib-based software work at all is dizzying.

* GNU projects have a lot of odd contribution hurdles: I've still never managed to connect with GRUB maintainers despite trying the Savannah page and the mailing lists. It was a chore to upstream other things.

> GNU projects have a lot of odd contribution hurdles

Indeed. While some GNU projects are high quality many of the projects can be a bit too insular and crufty.

scudo requires 64-bit atomics which make libc hookup on 32-bit systems a bit of a pain but nothing that cannot be overcome

it can only use the primary32 allocator on 32-bit systems, which is fine, chimera uses primary32 universally because it uses less virtual memory while performing more or less the same in practice

it's significantly and visibly faster than mallocng in most things user-facing, effectively anything that allocates and is multi-threaded (e.g. builds - LTO linking times take a third the time, web browsers are snappier, java is snappier, etc)

> In general, it is not clear to me why Adelie should be preferred over, say, Alpine.

Adelie is basically alpine but with a much bigger desktop focus. That's its raison d'etre, to stick with the French :)

> Adelie is basically alpine but with a much bigger desktop focus. That's its raison d'etre, to stick with the French :)

I think it would be helpful for this to be mentioned more prominently on the webpage. Maybe it is and I haven't spent enough time on the website.

The Adelie webpage should be a bit more technical in nature IMHO -- the front page seemed more targetted at managers than developers. Sadly, the Adelie website feels a bit generic in its current state -- there are so many "corporate" websites like this.

Home pages of Alpine Linux, Arch Linux etc. are ultimately useful to developers I think because the density of information is a bit higher and the marketing messages, while they exist, are not so front and center.