Re: [PATCH 4/4] New automake command line option `--silent-rules'.

[Ralf Wildenhues]

* Ralf Corsepius wrote on Tue, Mar 10, 2009 at 09:02:50AM CET:
> Ralf Wildenhues wrote:
>> * Ralf Corsepius wrote on Mon, Mar 09, 2009 at 03:57:58PM CET:
>>>>> All this silencing stuff does is to add further potential sources of 
>>>>> errors.
>>
>> Certainly.  All new code does this, to some degree.
>
> Right .. and the autotools have an infamous record of doing so.

Acknowledged.  Which is why I'm asking (everyone, not just you)
for test feedback.

autotools are in a bit awkward position when it comes to backward
compatibility: much of the API is hard to well-define, and many
internal details are easily exposed to the user.  This often leads
to user packages relying on internal details, willingly or not.

That said, we have the choice to either stagnate or move forward
cautiously, trying to learn from past mistakes and be better next
time.  If you want the former, then you need to keep using one of
the older Automake releases.  For the latter, my current approach
is to try to add as exhaustive as possible code coverage in the
test suite.  I don't see an alternative to this, but neither am I
willing to let autotools stand completely still.

>> The patches in the branch should not modify automake's output much if
>> the `silent' option is not used.
>
> %VERBOSE%

Can you be a bit more specific in what you mean here?  Without the
`silent' option, both %VERBOSE% and %SILENT% expand to empty strings.
Thanks.

>> My particular question above was meant as: I am unsure whether the
>> fourth patch in the series is worth applying. 
>
> I haven't checked all details of the patches, because I consider this  
> whole endeavor (adding --silent) to be adding nothing but useless bloat  
> to cater some people's demands, who are not able to understand the harm  
> "silencing" does.

I understand and respect your opinion on this, but would like to
disagree respectfully on the "nothing but useless bloat" part.

>> I do consider the series
>> worth applying, and I will use patches 1-3 plus fixes unless we find a
>> very serious issue with it.
> Well, I disagree - Once it's in you will not be able to get rid of it  
> for at least the next decade.

Certainly true.

>> My current take on patch 4 is this:
>>
>> It has the chance of making silent rebuilds easy for distributors,
>
> Depends on whom you are referring to as "distributors"
>
> Upstream maintainers (people who distribute tarballs) are interested  
> seeing verbose logs, to be able to go after issues their users have.
> "Silencing" will force them to tell their users to "please disable  
> silencing", your logs don't contain sufficient information.

OK.  They should just not enable the `silent' option then.

> OS vendors/distributors are interested in seeing verbose logs, because  
> they typically are running build jobs in batches and therefore have a  
> need to analyze their batches' logs (not only in case of breakdowns, but  
> also to verify "correct operation").

Likewise.  Alternatively, if the package author _has_ enabled the
`silent' option, they can set `V=1; export V' in their environment
to have verbose builds through the board.

> Developers are interested in seeing verbose logs, because they want to  
> see their bugs, not only fatal ones but also "silent ones" (e.g.  
> compilers receiving duplicate/bogus CPPFLAGS)

See above.

> There is only one group who is interested in "real silence":
> Occasional random users, who are not able to understand/parse the verbosity.

I've been working with this patch set for the last few months, as a test
bed, in my own software.  I've come to like it for those builds where
I'm primarily not interested in build system-specific issues.

>> Ralf, wishing people would spend as much time writing tests as they
>> would discussing
>
> Well, silencing to me is such kind of absurd, I am not interested in  
> testing this.

Sure.  This comment was not intended to be directed at you alone, nor
was it intended to mean this topic alone.

Cheers, and thank you for the feedback,
Ralf