My periodic bark at auto "tools" 2003/1 edition (was Re:rtems-ss-20030128)

[Thomas Doerfler]

Hello Ralf,

> Am Mon, 2003-02-03 um 16.15 schrieb Thomas Doerfler:
> > Hello,
> > 
> > ... many lines snipped...
> > 
> > > > 
> > > > * Rebuild the rpms from source and edit the rpm.specs on your demands.
> > > > (This typically means to change the package names and the prefix - and
> > > > to read the manual of another tool: rpm)
> > > 
> > > We have considered building release tools to install into a separate
> > > $prefix from snapshots.  Something like /opt/rtems-4.6 instead of
> > > /opt/rtems.  This doesn't solve your immediate problem but distinguishes
> > > release branch tools from development branch ones.
> > 
> > years ago there was
> Here, you say it "was". It simply doesn't work!
> 

I confirm with you that there is no general solution to it, 
but we "only" need a solution that works for a certain RTEMS 
snapshot. 

> >  an aproach of installing a given toolset 
> > (gcc/binutils/newlib/etc...) to something like
> > 
> > /opt/rtems/gcc-2.95.2-binutils-2.8-newlib-x.y
> > 
> It tries to apply a classification into certain categories.
> At the beginning such attempts look promising, but at some point later,
> somebody will be asking for addition or removal of a new category. 
> 
> Very soon you'll end up with
> "gcc-2.95.2-binutils-2.13-withoutpthreads-noi18n-nomp-womenonly"
> 
> As such tuples actually span a multidimensional matrix, you'll very soon
> get lost in "vector space".
> 

Hm, I can't quite follow you: As far as I have seen in the 
past, whenever a new RTEMS snapshot was available, there were 
general guidelines saying "The snapshot works with gcc-A.B-C 
and binutils-d.e.f and newlib g.h". No differences between 
BSPs, architectures, used subpackages and so on. So from my 
point of view for each RTEMS snapshot there is ONE recommended 
toolset, and the same toolset might even work for multiple 
snapshots :-). 

You know, maybe I have a more "user"-like view to the tools 
than guys like Joel and you, I can guess that you have many 
intermediate toolset versions between snapshots, but most 
users step from one snapshot to the next (even maybe skip some 
snapshots until they want to use new features). 

Another point: whenever somebody mentions the need to install 
multiple toolset versions on the same machine, he/she gets the 
answer "rebuild the toolset with different prefixes", well 
this once again leads to having toolset-dependent installation 
directories, and that's exactly what I would like to have. 

Maybe the naming scheme mentioned above is not the best one, 
maybe it would be better to couple the toolset install 
directory name to the RTMES snapshot version or something like 
that, but I think ANY version-dependent installation dirctory 
in the standard RPMs would be better than the current choices, 
that are:

A:) Install only ONE toolset on a certain machine (and 
deinstall/install another toolset when you switch to a 
different RTEMS snapshot)

or

B:) Rebuild the RPMs (which is really easy, I like it now) and 
apply your own home-brewn naming scheme to the installation 
prefix.

Any other opinions on this discussion? 

wkr,
	Thomas.

P.S.: Ralf, I really want to thank you for the work you do for 
RTEMS, I don't understand all the ideas behind 
autoconf/automake, but I am sure it keeps the RTEMS source 
tree manageable. 


--------------------------------------------
IMD Ingenieurbuero fuer Microcomputertechnik
Thomas Doerfler           Herbststrasse 8
D-82178 Puchheim          Germany
email:    Thomas.Doerfler at imd-systems.de
PGP public key available at: http://www.imd-
systems.de/pgp_keys.htm