Summary and Info:
Right now most of PKGBUILDs are using one of those two lines:
arch=('i686' 'x86_64')
arch=('any')

but if i have some well written portable source. eg:

#include <stdio.h>
int main(void) { puts("hello"); } /*or something more complex... */

i can compile it on almost any architecture imaginable and on any architecture where gcc is available. i can't use arch=('any'), because it means binary portability, but what should i say for source portability? IMHO there should be one more option.

Archlinux have thousands of packages with arch=('i686' 'x86_64') so if i will want to port them for example on som MIPS(EL) or ARM i will need to fix all those PKGBUILDs. Why packages are not just using something like arch=("$CARCH") or some lingo like carch, gnu, portable or something similar what will be replaced by $CARCH in makepkg...

It should be nice if ArchLinux can have majority of PKGBUILDS common for all architectures and ports. so i can just take ABS tree and build it on MIPS router, ARM PDA or i686 PC with GNU/HURD...


i guess changing all packages to arch=("$CARCH") if they can build with it is a good start...

if you don't like this idea, please discuss it and think about it for a while. i think it's not arch-way to have magicaly hardcoded whitelist of architectures in each source package... (especially if we know that it's not final). Today people like i686 and x86_64, but it's just some kind of trend or fashion and i hope there will come better architectures in (distant) future.