Re: [Mingw-cross-env-list] [PATCH] check target

[Volker Grabsch]

Tony Theodore <address@hidden> schrieb:
> On 2 October 2010 21:59, Volker Grabsch <address@hidden> wrote:
> >
> >        Maybe executing "TOOL --help" or something like that is a better
> >        way? (This is how we check for (g)sed, (g)patch, etc)
> 
> "which" is available on FreeBSD at least. How would it catch the
> missing g* variants or specific versions?

I'm not sure what you mean. I'm just wondering why Mark's script
is using "which" in connection with "test -x", instead of just
calling the tool with "--help".

Calling the tool with "--help" is what we're currently doing anyway,
in the macros for $(SED), $(PATCH), etc. And that seems to work
quite well.

> > 3) Provide a list of tools instead of a long "check" section. I could
> >   write the corresponing "macro foo" if you like.
> >
> >      TOOLS = wget openssl ...
> 
> Or even embed something like id="provides-tool-wget" in the anchor tag
> of docs that can be parsed. This probably assumes gsed is already
> available though.

I think this is going too far, because we'd then have to handle
special cases like requirements without a binary or requirements
with multiple binaries.

Also, currently the docs have place holders that a filled from
the Makefile (and hence the src/*.mk files). That is, we have
the direction "Makefile -> docs". I fear it could become quickly
confusing if we start doing that the other way round, too.

Nevertheless, I agree that the $(TOOLS) variable will have to be
kept up-to-date when new requirements arise, and that this is
manual work which is prone to mistakes. However, I don't think
that this danger is big enough to justify such a mechanism. In
addition, I hope that we won't add more requirements anytime
soon. :-)


Greets,
Volker

-- 
Volker Grabsch
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