Re: autoconf in pure MSVC environment?

[Andre Caldas]

Brandon J. Van Every wrote:
> How do I set up autoconf on Windows *without* any Cygwin or Mingw
> compilers or header files?  I only want a native MSVC environment, with
> typical mainstream Windows SDKs.  I don't want any UNIX environment at
> all, except what autoconf itself must have to run.  i.e. a shell, get m4
> working.  Would love to get rid of the UNIX shell if that's possible as
> well, but I suspect it isn't.

Autoconf needs the UNIX environment to work. Doesn't it?

Besides, you would have lots of trouble to make other compilers work
with autoconf. It's just easier to use gcc.

Probably there are GUI front ends available for those who are so scared
of the command line.

> Why bother in this way?
>
> Typically, someone writes some 'great' code on UNIX that uses autoconf.
> Then someone ports that code to a Cygwin or Mingw environment on
> Windows, without too much trouble.  *Then* someone like me comes along
> and tries to get rid of the project's UNIX dependencies.  Many apps
> don't need UNIX dependencies, they just have them because that's where
> the app was originally developed.


This has nothing to do with autoconf. Autoconf just test for features.


> So, my goal here is a tool to aid in porting UNIX applications to
> Windows.


Why would someone want to do that?

>  If autoconf searches for a bunch of UNIX header files, and
> barfs, that's good!  That tells me how trivial or impossible a project
> is going to be to port.
>
> I've tried to figure out "autoconf with almost no UNIX" before, but I
> ended up scratching my head.  I thought this time, I'd ask for
> suggestions.  If I could solve the problem, it would beat the heck out
> of trying to manually configure for Windows for every damn project.
> That kind of manual labor isn't worth it, when you're just trying to
> determine how deep a project's UNIX roots run.


I didn't quite understood what you are suggesting... it seems to me that
your problem has to do with developers who doesn't think "cross
plataform" enought to make applications that can be compiled on windows.
That's not their fault: microsoft makes no effort to make this easier.
Why developers should bother?

Andre Caldas.