Re: [PATCH] dist: add new "pure-dist" automake option
On Mon, Jul 5, 2021 at 4:16 PM Jim Meyering wrote: > In incidentally-related news, I found that make check now hangs on > tests-environment-fd-redirect on Fedora 34, so I'm investigating that. FYI, I'm currently working around this by disabling the ksh-testing part of that test: fedora-ksh-hang-workaround.diff Description: Binary data
Re: [PATCH] dist: add new "pure-dist" automake option
On Sun, Jul 4, 2021 at 2:19 PM Karl Berry wrote: > > - I used the word "pure" in the sense of a pure function, > > Yes, I realized. > > My thought was that, suppose some other similar change is needed in the > future that changes what gets automatically distributed, or > prerequisites, or whatever. However, we would not want to change the > effect of "pure-dist", because of compatibility, even if theoretically > this hypothetical change was also about "purity". Then the name would > become more confusing than helpful. > > Therefore it seems better to me to describe what the option actually > does (dist-no-built-sources) than to come up with a general name, > even though it is (granted) prettier. > > static-dist isn't any different in that regard. I like pure-dist better > than static-dist, of the two. > > I hear you about long option names, but ... I don't see a perfect answer > here. > > By the way, looking at the current list of AUTOMAKE_OPTIONS, I think the > name should definitely start with "dist-", whatever else. > > - My actual preference would be to have this be the default option. > Might we have a path some day to a place where this is true, > possibly after a transition period? > > Well, the decision is Jim's, as the primary maintainer. IMHO, retaining > compatibility is more important than relatively minor behavior > improvements when it comes to behavior of long-established programs like > Automake. If the BUILT_SOURCES dependency had only started a year or two > ago, maybe, but it's a lot older than that. > > Changing the default, at behavior any time, will inevitably induce > significant hassle for maintainers of packages which depend, possibly > unknowingly, on the current behavior. Having been that maintainer (on > the receiving end) more times than I count for such gratuitous behavior > "improvements", I prefer not to inflict it myself. > > - I made a mistake: I added the tests, but I forgot to add them to the > list of tests. > > I'll add it, no problem there. Thanks for the heads-up. -k Thanks to both of you. Let's go with dist-no-built-sources for the reasons Karl gave. Once the patch is fixed to reference the new tests from t/list-of-tests.mk, I saw only two other nits: - the copyright date in a new file should include only the current year - the test description should be updated (from copied file) to refer to the new test, e.g., # Ensure "dist-no-built-sources" option works as advertised. Switching names means references to "impure" are no longer appropriate, of course. In incidentally-related news, I found that make check now hangs on tests-environment-fd-redirect on Fedora 34, so I'm investigating that.
Re: [PATCH] dist: add new "pure-dist" automake option
- I used the word "pure" in the sense of a pure function, Yes, I realized. My thought was that, suppose some other similar change is needed in the future that changes what gets automatically distributed, or prerequisites, or whatever. However, we would not want to change the effect of "pure-dist", because of compatibility, even if theoretically this hypothetical change was also about "purity". Then the name would become more confusing than helpful. Therefore it seems better to me to describe what the option actually does (dist-no-built-sources) than to come up with a general name, even though it is (granted) prettier. static-dist isn't any different in that regard. I like pure-dist better than static-dist, of the two. I hear you about long option names, but ... I don't see a perfect answer here. By the way, looking at the current list of AUTOMAKE_OPTIONS, I think the name should definitely start with "dist-", whatever else. - My actual preference would be to have this be the default option. Might we have a path some day to a place where this is true, possibly after a transition period? Well, the decision is Jim's, as the primary maintainer. IMHO, retaining compatibility is more important than relatively minor behavior improvements when it comes to behavior of long-established programs like Automake. If the BUILT_SOURCES dependency had only started a year or two ago, maybe, but it's a lot older than that. Changing the default, at behavior any time, will inevitably induce significant hassle for maintainers of packages which depend, possibly unknowingly, on the current behavior. Having been that maintainer (on the receiving end) more times than I count for such gratuitous behavior "improvements", I prefer not to inflict it myself. - I made a mistake: I added the tests, but I forgot to add them to the list of tests. I'll add it, no problem there. Thanks for the heads-up. -k
Re: [PATCH] dist: add new "pure-dist" automake option
hello everyone, Thanks for the quick progress here, and the kind words. A few notes: - I used the word "pure" in the sense of a pure function, without side effects. I had started with a very long flag name but when you have a few different flags in your AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE macro this quickly gets out of hand. I thought fairly hard about the best possibility for a short name which is still somewhat descriptive. Perhaps the docs could be tweaked a bit to make the link more clear. For what it's worth, the other option I considered was static-dist. Maybe this would be better? - My actual preference would be to have this be the default option. Might we have a path some day to a place where this is true, possibly after a transition period? - I made a mistake: I added the tests, but I forgot to add them to the list of tests. Can someone make sure that gets fixed on merging, or should I email an updated patch? Thanks very much, Allison On Sun, 4 Jul 2021, 00:28 Karl Berry, wrote: > insinuates itself into where help2man was looking for the executables > and extracts the --help text directly from the *source*. > > Sorry to hear about that trouble, Zack. > > I expect we will install Allison's patch (maybe under a different name) > for the next release. Just waiting to hear back from Jim. --thanks, karl. > >
Re: [PATCH] dist: add new "pure-dist" automake option
insinuates itself into where help2man was looking for the executables and extracts the --help text directly from the *source*. Sorry to hear about that trouble, Zack. I expect we will install Allison's patch (maybe under a different name) for the next release. Just waiting to hear back from Jim. --thanks, karl.
Re: [PATCH] dist: add new "pure-dist" automake option
On Fri, Jul 2, 2021 at 11:09 AM Allison Karlitskaya wrote: > > Since v1.15.1-204-gac47c22e3, "make dist" has been depending on > $(BUILT_SOURCES) to avoid problems when building some GNU packages which > need to compile themselves as part of building their tarballs (for > example, to generate manpage content from --help output). I have no comment on your patch, but I want to mention that the "compile self in order to generate manpages that go into the tarball" process is troublesome for several other reasons; for the recent release of autoconf itself, I wound up writing a script that insinuates itself into where help2man was looking for the executables and extracts the --help text directly from the *source*. zw
