xc/programs considered harmful

[Keith Packard]

Around 22 o'clock on Dec 17, Vladimir Dergachev wrote:

> This might provide an easy migration path - have xc as is, create new 
> modules pointing to individual components (Xserver, fonts, library. 
> programs) and gradually apply patches allowing components to build when 
> checked out by themselves.

Unfortunately, to create viable stand-alone packages, you have to move
individual files around within the tree which breaks the Imake build
system.  While it would be possible to both create a modular build
environment *and* maintain the monolithic build system using imake, it's a
tremendous additional burden on the development process, especially as that
would really need to guarantee perfect source and binary compatibility
independent of the build system across a wide variety of operating systems.

I don't believe we should waste people's time like this; we have few 
enough developers as it is to consider spending years fixing duplicate 
build systems.

-keith


-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 228 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://lists.x.org/archives/xorg/attachments/20041217/4dcaa44a/attachment.pgp>