From: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Date: Mon, 11 Nov 2024 10:36:26 GMT
Subject: Re: [RFC PATCH v4 00/19] Modernize the build system
Message-ID: <ZzHeKkrOt8Tp3OaJ@pks.im>
In-Reply-To: <2dc3433a-4440-4216-8fd1-3776c8293674@gentoo.org>

On Mon, Nov 04, 2024 at 10:03:17AM -0500, Eli Schwartz wrote:
> On 11/4/24 7:17 AM, Patrick Steinhardt wrote:
> > The solution to that problem is autoconfiguration by detecting platform
> > specific bits and pieces. And we _also_ have such a build system in the
> > form of autoconf, but now we're entering territory that is awfully hard
> > to maintain. Most people don't use it at all, the only user seems to
> > really be distros. And they tend to hit many issues with autoconf
> > because we devs don't use that infra in the first place, creating a bit
> > of an awkward situation. Unifying this infrastructure such that devs and
> > packagers use the same build infra is thus another goal of my series.
> 
> 
> As a distro packager (not of git specifically), my understanding was
> that *no* distros use the autoconf, and that at least some distros say
> the reason for this is that the autoconf is so unused that it doesn't
> actually work.
> 
> We tried to use the autoconf but failed.

I thought I saw some distros using autoconf, so it at least isn't
_completely_ broken. Let me double check... FreeBSD uses it, but other
than that all the others that I've checked use the Makefile directly.

Patrick