Re: [boost] Re: Why Jam?

From: David B. Held (dheld_at_[hidden])
Date: 2002-02-22 17:31:02

-----Original Message-----
From: Ross Smith <r-smith_at_[hidden]>
To: boost_at_[hidden] <boost_at_[hidden]>
Date: Friday, February 22, 2002 03:56 PM
Subject: Re: [boost] Re: Why Jam?

>bill_kempf wrote:
>> [...]
>> Careful.  Calling things a "bad joke" isn't likely to get you any
>> help.
>
>Where did I ask for help?

I would say that whining about the lack of autoconf support pretty
much constitutes "wanting help installing Boost".

>I'm just one of the voices in the wilderness here trying to point 
>out the state of the emperor's clothes.

That's cute, but the autoconf crowd sounds like a broken record
at this point.  Instead of self-righteousness, why don't you put your
money where your mouth is and actually implement an autoconf
setup, and submit it?

>I guess that finally makes it explicit. Boost is aimed purely at 
>closed source developers, and the powers that be have no 
>plans to make it usable with open source.

Last time I checked, the Open Source philosophy didn't state
anything about software installation.  If I understand him correctly,
I think Richard Stallman would see your fascist insistence on
autoconf as the type of needless restrictions that hinder the
progress of software development.  Open Source isn't about
whining to get what you want.  It's about writing what you want.
If you want to write autoconf scripts, it looks certain that they
will be welcome.

>If you believe that's an unfair paraphrase of your position, then 
>I challenge you to explain how Boost can be used in an open 
>source project in its current state or the foreseeable future.

I foresee a future where someone takes up the gauntlet of
actually producing autoconf scripts for those that want it, and
accepting the challenge of maintaining those scripts in the
spirit of volunteerism that is Boost, as far as I can tell.  If the
Boost developers, maintainers, and moderators were producing
a proprietary library, then, by all means, I would expect them
to cater to their users.  As such, I expect people to be grateful
for what is freely offered, and help provide missing but desired
capability where possible.

I don't have to distribute Boost headers or libraries, so I don't
feel the pain of an undeveloped installation process.  But
I've seen just a few arguments against Jam repeated about
forty times, and I think we've heard just about everything that
can be said on the subject.  If I had a need for autoconf, I
would certainly try to produce autoconf setups for the libraries
of interest, and ask help from the authors when their cooperation
is needed.  Why can't you do that?

Dave