Downloading and installing a very old version of gcc

UNIX for Beginners Q & A
1

I would like to acquire a very old version of gcc: 4.4.3 and set it up in such a way that I can use the

update-alternatives

command to switch between my current version and the older version. I believe I may have found a website where I can download 4.4.3 from. However, I am not sure what all I need from that website or where exactly I should be installing too. If I search my kernel for gcc it would seem my current version is a symbolic link located @

/usr/lib/gcc/x86_64-linux-gnu/7.3.0

and is linked to Folder

inode/directory

There are actually three folders in that directory: 7, 7.3.0 and 8 (empty folder).

So I am hoping someone might be able to help me understand both what I should be downloading and where I should be unpacking it such that I can run the command:

sudo update-alternatives --config gcc

to select which version of gcc I want my computer to default to for a compilation. Also, if this is not the right website to download from, then where would be the correct place to download gcc version 4.4.3 from. I would start tinkering but I certainly dont want to break anything.

2

The usual problem is that this "update-alternatives" command may not have existed when 4.4.3 was being used and hence nobody has integrated it into your distro that way.

What is your distribution?

3

The version of update-alternatives is 1.19.0.5 and my distribution is Ubuntu 18.04. If I can't use the update-alternatives command maybe I could just make a symbolic link for gcc and switch them manually in a terminal? I also have another distribution on this computer: Ubuntu 16.04.

4

Depends on your build process. A lot of things using "configure", etc will let you do CC=/path/to/gcc CXX=/path/to/g++ ./configure

5

Any idea on which of those downloads I am looking for in that link I provided? My guess would be:

https://ftp.gnu.org/icons/unknown.gifgcc-4.4.3.tar.bz22010-01-21 08:32   60M  https://ftp.gnu.org/icons/unknown.gifgcc-4.4.3.tar.bz2.sig2010-01-21 08:32   72   https://ftp.gnu.org/icons/compressed.gifgcc-4.4.3.tar.gz2010-01-21 08:32   78M  https://ftp.gnu.org/icons/unknown.gifgcc-4.4.3.tar.gz.sig2010-01-21 08:33   72
6

The two large files are functionally equivalent, using different methods of compression.

The two small ones are just checksums for the big ones.

1 Like
7

Be sure its prefix is /usr/local when you compile it, not /usr, so as to avoid overwriting your existing gcc and include files.