Re: cooperating with pkg-config (was: installable gnulib library

[Bruce Korb]

Hi Gary,

On Mon, Oct 11, 2010 at 12:31 AM, Gary V. Vaughan wrote:
> It is the .pc files that are the problem actually.

Yes.  I understand.  It is a nuisance to find them on a system.

> libtool already contains most of the information that pkg-config wants,

Yep.  And rather than what would likely be a futile fight to
migrate from ``pkg-config --cflags libname'' to ``libtool
--show=cflags libname''
(or something), just say, "fine.  Here's a script to emit libname.pc for you."
Alternatively, you could provide a patch to pkg-config to look for the .la
files based upon /etc/ld.so.conf and cause it to exec libtool to process it.
Erode the thing by making the .la files more convenient than .pc files.
(Not very hard to do.....likely not today tho)

>  No .pc files required.

Less client hassle is _always_ better.

>  No PKG_CONFIG_PATH required.

YES!!!

> Much much easier to use and maintain for all involved... pity
> about all the man years wasted on pkg-config :(

Indeed.  Still, it's better erode its usefulness than to try to push it aside,
I think anyway.  So, first, fiddle libtool to emit the data found in .la files
then provide a pkg-config patch that uses the libtool functionality.
Whether they accept it or not, eventually ``libtool --show'' would likely
win out.  Let's do this in all our copious spare time......

 - Bruce