w3m / boehm-gc issue (really is getcontext in x86_64)

[John Marino]

> On 2010-07-30 Markus Pfeiffer wrote:
>> On 2010-07-06, Matthew Dillon <dillon at apollo.backplane.com> wrote:
>>
>>:Dear all,
>>:
>>:I started using dragonfly not too long ago. I wanted to build w3m from
>>:pkgsrc on x86_64. Configure failed in a check for libgc, which is installed.
>>:I found out that libgc uses getcontext (and assumes it to exist) which it 
>>:doesn't on x86_64 dragonfly. 
>>:To fix boehm-gc + w3m, I just inserted a defined(__DragonFly__) into mach_deps.c 
>>:Would it be a good idea to port the i386 version of getcontext into x86_64? I 
>>:am willing to do that, then.
>>:
>>:Markus
>>
>>    Yes, it would be a good idea!  I didn't even realize that we did not
>>    have a getcontext() implementation for x86_64 in libc.  It looks
>>    fairly straight-forward if you are familiar with x86_64 argument
>>    passing.  If you have questions you can ask them here or on irc.
>>
> 
> Heya,
> 
> Just to keep everyone updated on the matter: It took me longer than expected 
> to get it working (mainly due to the fact that I am running dfly in a VM at 
> the time which does not do make quickworld very quickly.)
> 
> I think I have a working getcontext now, I will implement setcontext as 
> well and then submit a patch. I would then appreciate testing and someone
> to look at it whether there is nothing massively broken (I believe get_mcontext 
> was broken as well).
> 
> Markus


I can't find any follow up.  Did this effort die?
This issue comes up repeatedly for x86_64:
  http://bugs.dragonflybsd.org/issues/2108
  http://bugs.dragonflybsd.org/issues/2179

Numerous packages won't build on x86_64 because of this missing
functionality, including ruby193-based packages and anything depending
on boehm-gc.  I consider this a "must-fix" issue before the next
release.  I am not comfortable creating this feature myself.  It would
be great if somebody who is qualified to do it start working in earnest
on it as pkgsrc 2011Q4 freeze is almost here.

This has been discussed many times in IRC but in the end nothing is
getting done.  None of the IRC talk is making it back to "bugs" either.
 18 months has gone by since this thread started...

John