One of our developers has discovered the reason why a bad property is not correctly reported by boost-build:

I think the $(e) should be $(property) share/boost-build/src/build/property.jam line 576:

--- a/share/boost-build/src/build/property.jam

+++ b/share/boost-build/src/build/property.jam

@@ -573,7 +573,7 @@ rule translate ( properties * : project-id : project-location : context-module )

else

{

import errors ;

- errors.error "'$(e)' is not a valid property specification" ;

+ errors.error "'$(property)' is not a valid property specification" ;

}

} else {

local attributes = [ feature.attributes $(feature) ] ;

to test I’ve got this target with a bad property:

alias CPU_H2I : : : : blah ;

with $(e) you get no error message:

D:/gia6300/dev/support/tools/boost-build/share/boost-build/src/build\property.jam:576: in property.translate from module property

D:/gia6300/dev/support/tools/boost-build/share/boost-build/src/build\property-set.jam:432: in property-set.create-from-user-input from module property-set

D:/gia6300/dev/support/tools/boost-build/share/boost-build/src/build\targets.jam:1629: in targets.main-target-usage-requirements from module targets

D:/gia6300/dev/support/tools/boost-build/share/boost-build/src/build\alias.jam:69: in alias from module alias

src\build.jam:9: in modules.load from module Jamfile<D:\gia6300\dev\src>

D:/gia6300/dev/support/tools/boost-build/share/boost-build/src/build\project.jam:311: in load-jamfile from module project

D:/gia6300/dev/support/tools/boost-build/share/boost-build/src/build\project.jam:64: in load from module project

D:/gia6300/dev/support/tools/boost-build/share/boost-build/src/build\project.jam:89: in load-used-projects from module project

D:/gia6300/dev/support/tools/boost-build/share/boost-build/src/build\project.jam:75: in load from module project

D:/gia6300/dev/support/tools/boost-build/share/boost-build/src/build\project.jam:145: in project.find from module project

D:/gia6300/dev/support/tools/boost-build/share/boost-build/src\build-system.jam:535: in load from module build-system

D:\gia6300\dev\support\tools\boost-build\share\boost-build\src\kernel\modules.jam:289: in import from module modules

D:\gia6300\dev\support\tools\boost-build\share\boost-build\src\kernel\bootstrap.jam:139: in boost-build from module

D:\gia6300\dev\support\tools\boost-build\share\boost-build\boost-build.jam:8: in module scope from module

fixed with the $(property) I get the error message:

D:/gia6300/dev/support/tools/boost-build/share/boost-build/src/build\property.jam:576: in property.translate from module property

error: 'blah' is not a valid property specification