Re: build systems

["Jonathon Jongsma" <jonathon quotidian org>]

On 11/9/07, Lucas Rocha <lucasr gnome org> wrote:
> I don't want to comment about any specific build system. I have a
> couple of more fundamental questions about this topic though:
>
>  - What's the *problem* that needs to be solved that really demands us
> to choose another build system?

I think daniel did a pretty good job of explaining the issues in his
original email, didn't he?  In reading his email I found myself
agreeing with almost everything he wrote, even though in the final
analysis, I think autofoo is probably still the best thing we've got.
The barrier to contribution issue is the one that I think is most
important.  In thinking back a few years ago when I was trying to
learn autotools, I had a lot of the same frustrations and may well
have just given up had I been any less determined to learn.

> - Are the current drawbacks of using autotools in GNOME so so so
> annoying that it would be really worth the effort of migrating to
> something else?

The only reason I could imagine migrating to something else at the
moment would be if it lowered the barrier to contribution so that we
got enough new contributors to offset the amount of work it required.
I'm doubtful that this would actually happen though, and we'd need to
be 100% sure that the system we were moving to was an improvement.

-- 
jonner