[Mono-list] Mono Tools and Utilities

[Peter Williams]

Hi Jon,

On Sun, 2003-10-12 at 10:59, Jonathan Pryor wrote:
> So I would also propose the following:
> 
> 	1.  Move mcs/build into a new CVS repository, "build"
> 	2.  Use the CVS aliasing functionality [1] to insert the "build"
> 	    CVS repository into the "mcs" and "mono-tools" repositories.
> 	    This would allow the build system to be located in one
> 	    location, and all users would receive updates
> 	    simultaneously.

As the guy who wrote most of the build system, I'm not sure if this is
the best idea, although the build system is so low-maintenance that I
don't think moving it would be a huge problem. My reasons are:

	* A lot of the build system is about supporting *complex* 
	  cross-platform compilations: of corlib, with large source
	  trees, with interdependent libraries, etc. I suspect 
	  mono-tools' needs would be simpler, and could probably be
	  met with a much smaller set of Makefile code

	* Trying to implement a nontrivial build with make is just so
	  much more of a hassle than it should be. On the other hand,
	  I think nant has many bad design decisions, and although I
	  have an (IMHO) awesome idea and basic framework for a C# 
	  build tool, I (of course) have ~0 free time to work on it.

	* This is relatively minor, but if more projects start using
	  the build/ files, then they *will* become high maintenance,
	  and if people are going to spend time on a build system, I'd
	  much rather it be on implementing a better one, rather than
	  working within the confines of pure make.

Anyway, if you want to alias the build/ stuff, I'm not against it, I'm
just not totally encouraging it. My feeling is it might be easiest and
sanest just to bolt into autoconf/automake as best you can.

	Peter

-- 
Peter Williams                          peter@newton.cx

"[Ninjas] are cool; and by cool, I mean totally sweet."
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