Re: autoconf + automake support for MSVC

[Peter Rosin]

Den 2011-09-03 03:47 skrev Bruno Haible:
> Peter Rosin wrote:
>> I didn't want to create yet another fork of cccl, and instead fixed
>> the 'compile' script in Automake to handle the bits that must be
>> handled by the build tools (and taught libtool to deal with cl
>> natively). What I didn't do was add all sorts of options to
>> 'compile' to make cl look like gcc, because that way lies madness.
>> ...
>> 'compile' makes cl understand the
>> -l and -L options (and a few others).
> 
> So, if I understand it right, you *don't* want to assume that $CC
> understands -l and -L options, like the C compiler in POSIX does for
> ages (cf.
> <http://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/utilities/c99.html>).

I think you misunderstand, AM_PROG_CC_C_O clobbers $CC and prepends
/path/to/package/build-aux/compile if $CC does not support
-c and -o at the same time, something cl does not (the function
as such is there, but you say -Fo<file> instead of -o <file>). If
AM_PROG_CC_C_O is not used in configure.ac (and hence, no 'compile'
script inside the package) you can say CC="/path/to/other/compile cl"
explicitly instead.

> And since Autoconf scripts invoke $CC directly and not 'build-aux/compile',
> all Autoconf macros that use -l or -L need to be adapted, so that they
> handle 'cl' directly.

Since $CC is updated by AM_PROG_CC_C_O your assumption does not hold.

> Can you please send patches to support 'cl' for these uses in gnulib?

No need for that, as I think all of the below is handled for cl by a
current 'compile' script.

> getaddrinfo.m4:46:      LIBS="$LIBS -lws2_32"
> getaddrinfo.m4:56:      GETADDRINFO_LIB="-lws2_32"
> gethostname.m4:24:       LIBS="$LIBS -lws2_32"
> gethostname.m4:34:      GETHOSTNAME_LIB="-lws2_32"
> gettext.m4:268:        LIBS=`echo " $LIBS " | sed -e 's/ -lintl / /' -e 's/^ 
> //' -e 's/ $//'`
> hostent.m4:30:         LIBS="$LIBS -lws2_32"
> hostent.m4:44:        HOSTENT_LIB="-lws2_32"
> lib-link.m4:85:      *" -l"*) LIBS="$LIBS $LIB[]NAME" ;;
> lib-link.m4:322:                -L*)
> lib-link.m4:373:            LTLIB[]NAME="${LTLIB[]NAME}${LTLIB[]NAME:+ 
> }-L$found_dir -l$name"
> lib-link.m4:460:                LIB[]NAME="${LIB[]NAME}${LIB[]NAME:+ 
> }-L$found_dir -l$name"
> lib-link.m4:529:                  -L*)
> lib-link.m4:610:                  -l*)
> lib-link.m4:730:            -L) next=yes ;;
> lib-link.m4:731:            -L*) dir=`echo "X$opt" | sed -e 's,^X-L,,'`
> servent.m4:32:         LIBS="$LIBS -lws2_32"
> socketlib.m4:20:      LIBS="$LIBS -lws2_32"
> socketlib.m4:34:      LIBSOCKET='-lws2_32'

'compile' handles -o, -l, -L, -Xlinker and -Wl, plus posix->win32 path
conversion. Maybe I have forgotten something but I think that's it.

Cheers,
Peter