Rewrote a cumbersome sentence to make it clearer. Capitalized the

names of packages. Clarified verbiage in re PIE & ASLR. Improved the
description of SSP, and tightened it up. Clarified the instructions
for running tests concurrently. Modified descriptions of tests that
fail. Patched up punctuation. Spelled "set up" correctly: "setup" is
a noun. The phrasal verb used here is spelled as two words. Use the
word "directives" to describe "#include" and similar preprocessor
instructions. Add periods to some otherwise complete sentences.

chapter08/gcc.xml

@@ -80,8 +80,8 @@ cd       build</userinput></screen>
              --disable-bootstrap      \
              --with-system-zlib</userinput></screen>
 
-    <para>Note that for other programming languages there are some prerequisites that
+    <para>GCC supports seven different computer languages, but the
-    are not yet available. See the
+    prerequisites for most of them have not yet been installed. See the
     <ulink url="&blfs-book;general/gcc.html">BLFS Book GCC page</ulink>
     for instructions on how to build all of GCC's supported languages.</para>
 
@@ -91,8 +91,8 @@ cd       build</userinput></screen>
       <varlistentry>
         <term><parameter>LD=ld</parameter></term>
         <listitem>
-          <para>This parameter makes the configure script use the ld installed
+          <para>This parameter makes the configure script use the ld program installed
-          by the binutils built earlier in this chapter, rather than
+          by the Binutils package built earlier in this chapter, rather than
           the cross-built version which would otherwise be used.</para>
         </listitem>
       </varlistentry>
@@ -101,7 +101,7 @@ cd       build</userinput></screen>
         <term><parameter>--with-system-zlib</parameter></term>
         <listitem>
           <para>This switch tells GCC to link to the system installed copy of
-          the zlib library, rather than its own internal copy.</para>
+          the Zlib library, rather than its own internal copy.</para>
         </listitem>
       </varlistentry>
     </variablelist>
@@ -109,21 +109,21 @@ cd       build</userinput></screen>
     <note>
       <anchor id="pie-ssp-info" xreflabel="note on PIE and SSP"/>
       <para>
-        PIE (position-independent executable) is a technique to produce
+        PIE (position-independent executables) are
         binary programs that can be loaded anywhere in memory.  Without PIE,
         the security feature named ASLR (Address Space Layout Randomization)
-        can be applied for the shared libraries, but not the executable
+        can be applied for the shared libraries, but not for the executables
-        itself.  Enabling PIE allows ASLR for the executables in addition to
+        themselves.  Enabling PIE allows ASLR for the executables in addition to
         the shared libraries, and mitigates some attacks based on fixed
         addresses of sensitive code or data in the executables.
       </para>
       <para>
         SSP (Stack Smashing Protection) is a technique to ensure
-        that the parameter stack is not corrupted. Stack corruption can
+        that the parameter stack is not corrupted. Stack corruption can,
-        for example alter the return address of a subroutine,
+        for example, alter the return address of a subroutine,
-        which would allow transferring control to some dangerous code
+        thus transferring control to some dangerous code
         (existing in the program or shared libraries, or injected by the
-        attacker somehow) instead of the original one.
+        attacker somehow).
       </para>
     </note>
 
@@ -133,10 +133,10 @@ cd       build</userinput></screen>
 
     <important>
       <para>In this section, the test suite for GCC is considered
-      important, but it takes a long time. First time builders are
+      important, but it takes a long time. First-time builders are
-      encouraged to not skip it.  The time to run the tests can be
+      encouraged to run the test suite.  The time to run the tests can be
-      reduced significantly by adding -jx to the make command below
+      reduced significantly by adding -jx to the <command>make -k check</command> command below,
-      where x is the number of cores on your system.</para>
+      where x is the number of CPU cores on your system.</para>
     </important>
 
    <para>One set of tests in the GCC test suite is known to exhaust the default
@@ -149,23 +149,23 @@ cd       build</userinput></screen>
 <screen><userinput remap="test">chown -Rv tester .
 su tester -c "PATH=$PATH make -k check"</userinput></screen>
 
-    <para>To receive a summary of the test suite results, run:</para>
+    <para>To extract a summary of the test suite results, run:</para>
 
 <screen><userinput remap="test">../contrib/test_summary</userinput></screen>
 
-    <para>For only the summaries, pipe the output through
+    <para>To filter out only the summaries, pipe the output through
     <userinput>grep -A7 Summ</userinput>.</para>
 
     <para>Results can be compared with those located at <ulink
     url="&test-results;"/> and
     <ulink url="https://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc-testresults/"/>.</para>
 
-    <para>In gcc, eleven tests, in the i386 test suite are known to FAIL.
+    <para>Eleven tests in the i386 test suite for the gcc compiler are known to FAIL.
     It's because the test files do not account for the
     <parameter>--enable-default-pie</parameter> option.</para>
 
-    <para>In g++, four tests related to PR100400 are known to be reported
+    <para>Four tests related to PR100400 may be reported
-    as both XPASS and FAIL.  It's because the test file for this known issue
+    as both XPASS and FAIL when testing the g++ compiler; the test file
     is not well written.</para>
 
     <para>A few unexpected failures cannot always be avoided. The GCC developers
@@ -187,8 +187,8 @@ su tester -c "PATH=$PATH make -k check"</userinput></screen>
 <screen><userinput remap="install">make install</userinput></screen>
 
     <para>The GCC build directory is owned by <systemitem class="username">
-    tester</systemitem> now and the ownership of the installed header
+    tester</systemitem> now, and the ownership of the installed header
-    directory (and its content) will be incorrect.  Change the ownership to
+    directory (and its content) is incorrect.  Change the ownership to the
     <systemitem class="username">root</systemitem> user and group:</para>
 
 <screen><userinput remap="install">chown -v -R root:root \
@@ -274,7 +274,7 @@ SEARCH_DIR("/usr/local/lib")
 SEARCH_DIR("/lib")
 SEARCH_DIR("/usr/lib");</computeroutput></screen>
 
-   <para>A 32-bit system may see a few different directories. For example, here
+   <para>A 32-bit system may use a few other directories. For example, here
    is the output from an i686 machine:</para>
 
 <screen><computeroutput>SEARCH_DIR("/usr/i686-pc-linux-gnu/lib32")
@@ -307,7 +307,7 @@ SEARCH_DIR("/usr/lib");</computeroutput></screen>
   at all, then something is seriously wrong. Investigate and retrace the
   steps to find out where the problem is and correct it. <!--The most likely
   reason is that something went wrong with the specs file adjustment.--> Any
-  issues will need to be resolved before continuing with the process.</para>
+  issues should be resolved before continuing with the process.</para>
 
   <para>Once everything is working correctly, clean up the test files:</para>
 
@@ -374,7 +374,7 @@ mv -v /usr/lib/*gdb.py /usr/share/gdb/auto-load/usr/lib</userinput></screen>
         <term><command>cpp</command></term>
         <listitem>
           <para>The C preprocessor; it is used by the compiler to expand the
-          #include, #define, and similar statements in the source files</para>
+          #include, #define, and similar directives in the source files</para>
           <indexterm zone="ch-system-gcc cpp">
             <primary sortas="b-cpp">cpp</primary>
           </indexterm>
@@ -407,7 +407,7 @@ mv -v /usr/lib/*gdb.py /usr/share/gdb/auto-load/usr/lib</userinput></screen>
           <para>A wrapper around <command>ar</command> that adds a
           plugin to the command line. This program is only used
           to add "link time optimization" and is not useful with the
-          default build options</para>
+          default build options.</para>
           <indexterm zone="ch-system-gcc gcc-ar">
             <primary sortas="b-gcc-ar">gc-ar</primary>
           </indexterm>
@@ -420,7 +420,7 @@ mv -v /usr/lib/*gdb.py /usr/share/gdb/auto-load/usr/lib</userinput></screen>
           <para>A wrapper around <command>nm</command> that adds a
           plugin to the command line. This program is only used
           to add "link time optimization" and is not useful with the
-          default build options</para>
+          default build options.</para>
           <indexterm zone="ch-system-gcc gcc-nm">
             <primary sortas="b-gcc-nm">gc-nm</primary>
           </indexterm>
@@ -433,7 +433,7 @@ mv -v /usr/lib/*gdb.py /usr/share/gdb/auto-load/usr/lib</userinput></screen>
           <para>A wrapper around <command>ranlib</command> that adds a
           plugin to the command line. This program is only used
           to add "link time optimization" and is not useful with the
-          default build options</para>
+          default build options.</para>
           <indexterm zone="ch-system-gcc gcc-ranlib">
             <primary sortas="b-gcc-ranlib">gc-ranlib</primary>
           </indexterm>
@@ -444,7 +444,7 @@ mv -v /usr/lib/*gdb.py /usr/share/gdb/auto-load/usr/lib</userinput></screen>
         <term><command>gcov</command></term>
         <listitem>
           <para>A coverage testing tool; it is used to analyze programs to
-          determine where optimizations will have the most effect</para>
+          determine where optimizations will have the greatest effect</para>
           <indexterm zone="ch-system-gcc gcov">
             <primary sortas="b-gcov">gcov</primary>
           </indexterm>
@@ -567,7 +567,7 @@ mv -v /usr/lib/*gdb.py /usr/share/gdb/auto-load/usr/lib</userinput></screen>
       <varlistentry id="liblto_plugin">
         <term><filename class="libraryfile">liblto_plugin</filename></term>
         <listitem>
-          <para>GCC's LTO plugin allows binutils to process object files
+          <para>GCC's LTO plugin allows Binutils to process object files
           produced by GCC with LTO enabled</para>
           <indexterm zone="ch-system-gcc liblto_plugin">
             <primary sortas="c-liblto_plugin">liblto_plugin</primary>
@@ -589,8 +589,8 @@ mv -v /usr/lib/*gdb.py /usr/share/gdb/auto-load/usr/lib</userinput></screen>
         <term><filename class="libraryfile">libssp</filename></term>
         <listitem>
           <para>Contains routines supporting GCC's stack-smashing protection
-          functionality.  Normally it's unused because glibc also provides
+          functionality.  Normally it is not used, because Glibc also provides
-          those routines</para>
+          those routines.</para>
           <indexterm zone="ch-system-gcc libssp">
             <primary sortas="c-libssp">libssp</primary>
           </indexterm>