Hi,
here is a patch to document ocaml-build-system.
>From 8854480a48e8096bf6bf8d94b3695fb049720038 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Julien Lepiller <jul...@lepiller.eu>
Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2017 12:11:42 +0100
Subject: [PATCH] doc: Document ocaml-build-system.
* doc/guix.texi (Build Systems) [ocaml-build-system]: New definition.
---
doc/guix.texi | 42 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
1 file changed, 42 insertions(+)
diff --git a/doc/guix.texi b/doc/guix.texi
index 8c4067fbd..832721243 100644
--- a/doc/guix.texi
+++ b/doc/guix.texi
@@ -3291,6 +3291,48 @@ specified with the @code{#:glib} parameter.
Both phases are executed after the @code{install} phase.
@end defvr
+@defvr {Scheme Variable} ocaml-build-system
+This variable is exported by @code{(guix build-sytem ocaml)}. It is implements
+a build procedure for ocaml packages, which consists of choosing the correct
+set of commands to run for each package. Ocaml packages can expect many
+different commands to be run. This build system will try some of them.
+
+When the package has a @file{setup.ml} file present at the top-level, it will
+run @code{ocaml setup.ml -configure}, @code{ocaml setup.ml -build} and
+@code{ocaml setup.ml -install}. The build system will assume that this file
+was generated by oasis and will take care of setting the prefix and enabling
+tests if they are not disabled. You can pass configure and build flags with the
+@code{#:configure-flags} and @code{#:build-flags}. The @code{#:test-flags} key
+can be passed to change the set of flags used to enable tests. The
+@code{#:use-make?} key can be used to bypass this system in the build and
+install phases.
+
+When the package has a @file{configure} file, it is assumed that it is a
+hand-made configure script that requires a different argument format than
+in the @code{gnu-build-system}. You can add more flags with the
+@code{#:configure-flags} key.
+
+When the package has a @file{Makefile} file (or @code{#:use-make?} is
+@code{#t}), it will be used and more flags can be passed to the build and
+install phases with the @code{#:make-flags} key.
+
+Finaly, some packages do not have these files and use a somewhat standard
+location for its build system. In that case, the build system will run
+@code{ocaml pkg/pkg.ml} or @code{ocaml pkg/build.ml} and take care of
+providing the path to the required findlib module. Additional flags can
+be passed via the @code{#:build-flags} key. Install is taken care by
+@command{opam-installer}. In this case, the @code{opam} package must
+be added to the @code{native-inputs} field of the package definition.
+
+Note that most ocaml packages assume they will be installed in the same
+directory as ocaml, which is not what we want in guix. In particular, they
+will install @file{.so} files in their module's directory, which is usually
+fine because it is in the ocaml compiler directory. In guix though, these
+libraries cannot be found and we use @code{CAML_LD_LIBRARY_PATH}. This variable
+points to @file{lib/ocaml/site-lib/stubslibs} and this is where @file{.so}
+libraries should be installed.
+@end defvr
+
@defvr {Scheme Variable} python-build-system
This variable is exported by @code{(guix build-system python)}. It
implements the more or less standard build procedure used by Python
--
2.11.0
