Re: A proposal for a modern build-system

From: Andrey Semashev (andrey.semashev_at_[hidden])
Date: 2024-03-22 13:22:40

On 3/22/24 16:03, Hassan Sajjad wrote:
>     Please, don't top-post.
> 
> Sorry, what do you mean by that? I use Reply All button in Gmail.

I've included a link to our discussion policies that, among other
things, explains what top-posting is. I'm including the link again, for
your convenience:

https://www.boost.org/community/policy.html#quoting

>     I can see
>     you're explicitly using std::filesystem in some examples, and that
>     reinforces my suspicion.
> 
> std::filesystem is much better than CMake filesystem API or any other
> build-system's filesystem API. And for anything advanced, much less
> verbose as-well.

It is better for some things and worse for others. Where in b2 or CMake
you would glob the filesystem using a wildcard, std::filesystem would
require one to write a loop with directory iterators and applying a
wildcard (which is not available in the std::filesystem). It would also
require one to handle any errors that might arise in the process.

>     I can believe it was easier *for you* to implement the build scenario in
>     HMake - because you know HMake. It won't be necessarily the case for
>     someone new to HMake, especially without documentation.
> 
> I would love to address if you have any specific complaints regarding
> documentation.  

My first complaint would be that it doesn't exist. Have a look at b2
docs or CMake reference for a few examples of what I have in mind.

>     Also, SFML looks like a much smaller library than Boost.
> 
> But it could be considered a middle-sized project. And I don't see a
> reason for my build-system to not scale. 

It's not so much about scaling (although scaling is not a given, too)
but about various features and corner cases. I mentioned configure-time
checks earlier. Then there are non-trivial dependencies between
libraries. There is support for configuration (e.g. which Boost
libraries to build, release/debug, single/multi-threaded, which C++
runtime to link, etc.). Then there are tests and documentation, which
also use a variety of tools to build.