RE: [xougen] Building from source [was: Regarding server side widgets]

[David Ross]

Hi Everyone,

I am not pro-Autotools nor am I anti-imake.  I am just trying to figure
out what we are doing and why so I can put it in the FAQ.  In fact, I am
all for status quo because it is proven already.  But that does not mean
that we should exclude other possibilities, especially if it keeps us
from reinventing the wheel.  There is some comparisons between the
Autotools and imake at
http://www.gnu.org/manual/autoconf-2.57/html_chapter/autoconf_17.html#SE
C178.  I realize that this is from the pro-Autotools camp.

I am all for simple, whether it is nCurses or tcl/tk or perl/tk or [your
mothers favourite menuing/gui system].  Am I making sense here?  I would
like to mention my positive experience with the Autotools in compiling
stuff on MacOSX and Linux[Debian/Mandrake/Redhat] and Cygwin.

Also, I have heard that there have been problems with the latest gnu
C-pre-processor (http://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/gcc-3.3.1/cpp/) and
imake.  Are we trying to ask the cpp to do something it wasn't designed
to do?  Are we going to inherit further problems into Xouvert because
of these problems with cpp?  I think one of our main goals is to be able
to have a Xserver compile with only what is needed to a specific system.
So I could compile my Xserver for my ATI 7000 card, and another one for
my iBook and another one for my Windows-Cygwin without compiling stuff
that would be needed for a NVIDIA system--but my friend could easily
compile the x-server for his NVIDIA system.   Does this make sense to
you guys?   Which ever way we decide to take the configuration route, I
am happy to learn and help out with that platform.  No doubt which way
we go, we will be helping that configuration platform become better,
more mature and more robust. (I love buzz words :) ).  Not only do we
need to consider what makes our lives easier now but also what the long
term implications will be.

Since there seems to be more pro imake people here on the mailing list
rather than the IRC, please let me know what your thoughts and
experiences have been.

Sorry about the long message, but I guess I had a number of questions
to ask ....

Thanks,
David

> -----Original Message-----
> From: address@hidden 
> [mailto:address@hidden
>  On Behalf Of Mark C. Ballew
> Sent: 2003 August 30 10:11 PM
> To: address@hidden
> Subject: Re: [xougen] Building from source [was: Regarding 
> server side widgets]
> 
> 
> On Sun, 2003-08-31 at 01:37, Arwed von Merkatz wrote:
> 
> > > I absolutely agree that what should be compiled should 
> only be what 
> > > is needed, and/or only what is needed should be loaded.  
> Similar to 
> > > the Linux method of configuration for compilation and for the 
> > > modules too. But what I have read about imake vs. the GNU 
> Autotools 
> > > is that imake is not very flexible in this regard.  Or am I dead 
> > > wrong?  Perhaps we need to add another level/layer of 
> abstraction on 
> > > top of imake?  I also read that there where some other 
> problems with 
> > > imake because it used the c-pre-processor, what has/have your 
> > > experiences been?
> > 
> > It is already possible to configure the xfree build process to only 
> > compile and install stuff you want/need. It can all be configure in 
> > the host.def, which drivers to compile, which apps, which libs, ...
> > 
> > All that is needed is imho a nice dialog based config tool 
> to do this.
> 
> I think the idea of having a solid installer for Xouvert is 
> an excellent idea. What do people think about a linux 
> kernel-like configuration process? Much like makeconfig or 
> even Freebsd's ncurses menus for checking what you want to 
> install/build?
> 
> As for imake vs. autoconf, I don't see what the big push is 
> to move over to automake, XFree86 compiles on a bizillion 
> different archs and OSes, why mess that up? autoconf/make can 
> be quite hellish.
> 
> What do people think about a simple (optional) ncurses 
> frontend for configuring Xouvert for compilation, creating 
> the imake file that is appropriate from this, and the go on 
> to compiling?
> 
> Leaving the imake stuff there will allow vendors (like 
> Freebsd, Debian,
> Gentoo) to compile from their port-like trees easily.
> 
> Mark 
> -- 
> Mark C. Ballew                                address@hidden
> http://sublinear.net                  http://markballew.com
> PGP: 0xB2A33008                               ICQ: 839986
> 
> 
> 
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