Recommended version of gcc?

Is there a recommended version of gcc to use when installing from source? I see CentOS7 is still listed as the reference platform. I ask since we found with PhoSim, the development team is using gcc 5.2.0 and it made a difference in terms of performance at NERSC.
Thanks,
Heather

All of our CI systems use gcc 4.8, I believe, but many of us are using gcc 5.x or gcc 6.x on our development systems (I’m running 5.4). I’m not sure if anyone is running on 7.x. As far as I know, the stack itself works fine on all those and we’d consider a failure to work with one of them a high-priority bug.

However, there have been problems with using gcc 5+ with using Anaconda (see DM-10343) and OpenMP (which we do not use ourselves, at least not yet), and in fact that’s been a big blocker for us moving to a newer gcc as our minimum compiler. That’s basically because Anaconda provides binaries that were compiled with a much older gcc. Before doing an Anaconda-based install on gcc 5+ on a big system, it’d be good to read through that issue and understand what might go wrong.

ok that helps! I’ve been using gcc 4.9.3, as I saw no reason to use a newer gcc at NERSC and we do use Anaconda (at least with some of our builds). It sounds as though that’s fine at the moment. Thank you!

Please also note DM-10902.
If and when that is solved we hope to be using devtoolset-6 (i.e. GCC 6.2.1) on our development systems (and that may become the recommended default).

2 Likes