[boost] Making toolchains easier to use

Subject: [boost] Making toolchains easier to use
From: Beman Dawes (bdawes_at_[hidden])
Date: 2009-11-11 11:39:49

I just tried to rebuild the Getting Started Guild on Windows 7,
something I had done many times on XP.

>cd \boost\trunk\more\getting_started
>bjam

The build failed. Inspecting the output turned up the message:

python: can't open file 'C:/Program
Files/Python26/Lib/site-packages/docutils/tools/rst2ht
ml.py': [Errno 2] No such file or directory

Ah! Because of the Win 7 upgrade, Python was reinstalled, and docutils
needs to be installed again, too.

Did that, but same problem. Ah! I remember from past pain. The
docutils install doesn't install "tools", you have to do that by hand.
Did that.

That worked. Only half an hour of my time wasted. If I had been a new
user or developer, it would have been much longer.

Here is what I think should have happened:

When the build failed, a dialog box or console message should have
popped up telling me that docutils/tools aren't installed, and asking
me if I wanted docutils/tools to be installed. If I answered yes, the
necessary download and install steps should have been performed
automatically.

Furthermore, I think the same thing should happen for any tool used by
Boost, whether it be for documentation or other purposes. I guess I
mean any tool run via bjam, at least at first.

This sort of auto install when needed is happens routinely for
non-boost apps on my Ubuntu system. It saves much time and
aggravation.

Thoughts?

--Beman