Re: [avr-chat] Can't Install avr-gcc in FreeBSD

[David Brown]

Joerg Wunsch wrote:
> David Brown <address@hidden> wrote:
>
> > But when you step outside of that, you enter the world of dependency
> > resolution, patching, ./configure, and make, instead of an
> > InstallShield wizard.
>
> C'mon.  The day you start to run ./configure is the day when you would
> have to give up on Windows, because nobody went there before, and
> prepared you the InstallShield Wizard package at all.

I've done the dependency resolution, patch, ./configure and make dance 
on windows as well as Linux, both for combinations that are rarely used 
and for programs that are fairly common (such as when testing newer 
versions of programs than a distro's standard repositories).  For many 
types of *nix programs, this is the standard way to install the software 
- and in many cases, it makes a lot of sense.  It is also a vital part 
of free and open source software.  But my point is that it can be a big 
hinder for people who are used to point-and-click installers, and are 
looking for something outside their distribution's standard packages.

> > Thus when trying to install avr-gcc on FreeBSD you have to fiddle
> > around with -DNOPORTDOCS flags in the "make install" line, while on
> > windows you just download the latest winavr release.
>
> Sorry, this is just avr-libc breakage, caused by the direct use of
> ISO8859-1 characters in avr-libc's doxygen source, and uncovered by
> FreeBSD upgrading their doxygen so the default changed from
> "pass-through" to "handle everything as UTF-8".  If it wasn't
> discovered by the FreeBSD build of the avr-libc package, it would
> probably have broken the next WinAVR release instead.  We simply need
> to fix it, and I just need time for that.

I was trying to make a general point about one of the possible reasons 
why Windows is still a more popular choice for some times of work, even 
amongst those who have an otherwise free choice.  avr-gcc is a special 
case - you and Eric (and others) put a great deal of effort into making 
it easy to install and use.  In many cases, however, it's a different 
matter.  The msp430 port of gcc, as an example, is a perfectly solid 
port of gcc (albeit somewhat out of date), but installation on Linux, 
last I checked, involves getting the gcc source tarballs, then patching 
based on the cvs versions of the msp430 patches.  Given the choice of 
that or a windows installer, I know which is easier and faster!

> Long story short, this is *not* the normal course of doing things in
> the FreeBSD ports system.  The -DNOPORTDOCS option is not there to
> work around bugs in the software, but to reduce the number of
> prerequisite tools for the mortal user, since doxygen and its
> documentation have a *lot* of prerequisites -- Eric Weddington can for
> sure tell you, he hasn't been able to build the avr-libc docs himself
> for the WinAVR distribution until very recently.  Before that, guess
> what he's been relying to for his WinAVR bundled docs?  Those that
> I've been creating on my FreeBSD machine...

There are certainly plenty of things that are easier to work with in 
*nix, although I haven't found doxygen to be a problem under windows (I 
haven't tried running the avrlibc source through it).  The real pain is 
often cygwin and it's assorted dll conflicts - some programs are 
difficult to build under mingw/msys (although the avr-gcc patches for 
building gcc for mingw have come in handy for me when building other gcc 
targets for mingw).

> Instead, normal FreeBSD usage would be that you proceed to your
> closest mirror, tell your sysinstall to install packages from it, and
> select "avr-gcc", "avr-libc" and maybe "avr-gdb".  Then, you install
> binary packages the same way as you would with WinAVR, except you've
> got finer control about what to include and what to leave out.

I haven't tried FreeBSD ports, but I gather it is similar to Gentoo's 
system - a package consists of a source code bundle, information on 
dependencies, a build "recipe", installation information, and the like. 
 As long as someone has put together that information for your chosen 
system, installation is generally simple (occasional slips can occur in 
any system), and normally faster and easier than windows-style 
installation wizards.  It is when the packages do not exist for your 
combination of distribution, chosen software, and required versions, 
that installation can be far more awkward with *nix.

mvh.,

David