Re: [boost] Library names in system layout on linux

Subject: Re: [boost] Library names in system layout on linux
From: dherring_at_[hidden]
Date: 2008-11-10 15:20:08

On Mon, 10 Nov 2008, Phil Endecott wrote:

> Scott McMurray wrote:
>> What if there were a way
>> to specify what you want, and for some program to find whatever
>> matches best?
>
> pkg-config++ ?
>
> The practical issue with that is that after introducing such a program
> I'd have to wait for N years until it was available in all deployed versions.

This is exactly why package-config and its ilk (including many hard-coded 
makefiles/jamfiles) are "the wrong thing" and autoconf and friends are 
"the right thing".  It is impossible to noncausally satisfy all the needs 
of a library's users, but it is possible for a library user to develop 
tests and workarounds for the features they need.  Such tests can then be 
distributed with the program sources and probe the installed libraries.

It is then up to the library developer to not complicate the user's life 
through misfeatures such as library name mangling and no soname 
versioning.  What was wrong with using different install paths to keep 
build types separate?

/end rant

- Daniel

P.S.  I love boost, just hate linking against it.  ;)