Re: [boost] jam build system

From: Beman Dawes (bdawes_at_[hidden])
Date: 2001-07-24 10:58:30

At 07:47 AM 7/24/2001, John Maddock wrote:

 >>Can it be done automatically? I'm not sure how David Turner feels about
 >>this, but FTJam is currently in the Perforce public depot, and he's been
 >>talking about an independent CVS host at SourceForge. The potential for
 >>things getting out of synch is not to be underestimated.
 >
 >I know. I just want this as easy as possible for new users...
 >
 >>"complete" pain? I agree that it's ugly, but it sounds like you're
 >>exaggerating a little bit. We're looking at alternatives (one involves
 >>compiling allyourbase.jam into Jam so you don't need the -f option), but
 >in
 >>the meantime I suggest you write yourself a little batch file or shell
 >>script that hides the need for the -f option.
 >
 >Well that's exactly what I did, I think I could even write a shell 
install
 >script that automates the production of a wrapper that sets environment
 >options and adds the necessary -f option, even so "allyourbase.jam" is
 >really ugly name IMHO, sorry :-(

Yes, I've been thinking the same thing.  I'd like to see scripts for at 
least Win32 and Unix systems.

It seems to me the commands might be used something like this (assuming the 
boost zip or tar file has been unzipped into boost-root):

    cd boost-root            // or maybe boost-root/tools/build
    jamboost compiler        // sets "compiler" as the default[s].
                             // may be a string with multiple compilers.

    jamboost                 // in effect, jamboost all
    jamboost -dir="c:\Program Files\Some Vendor\lib"  // same as prior,
                             // except move the libs to -dir
    jamboost clean           // remove intermediate files and directories

The details are open for discussion, but one aim might be that the user 
instructions are the same for Win32, Unix, and similar command line 
interpreter, so that we don't need two sets of user instructions.

 >>Can you give me some idea what you mean by "step by step instructions 
for
 >>particular compilers"? Users shouldn't have to know much of anything 
about
 >>particular compilers to use the system. That's the goal, at least.
 >
 >Sure but what options are available for particular compilers? what 
options
 >are available for all compilers? How do I insist that a build is
 >multi-threaded only? etc

Yes.

 >>I checked in a fix for Bill's Jamfile last week. Did you try
 >>getting his stuff from the thread-inital branch?
 >
 >No I got the zip, that may be the issue.

The .zip is obsolete; I've just deleted it.  The current files are in CVS 
in a branch named "thread-initial".  The docs and code may be out of sync 
since they are being worked on asynchronous by two or three people.

--Beman