Re: [jamboost] Re: [boost] cross-project dependencies

From: Vladimir Prus (ghost_at_[hidden])
Date: 2003-09-16 08:19:05

David Abrahams wrote:

> > Some followups are in
> > http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.lib.boost.build/2736/
> >
> > "//" is the separator between project-id and target-id.
>
> Oh. We never discussed using that notation, which may explain my
> confusion. Well, it's minimal and complete, but:
>
> 1. I am concerned that on some systems // is used to write remote
> paths.

I believe "//" has special meaning only at the beginning of remote path?

> 2. People read paths left-to-right. I thought it was helpful to
> have an @ at the beginning to say "this is a project path".

I think we've discussed this with Ali: he though "@" is unncecessary. In the 
end, I agreed to remove it, since we can always add it back if users start to 
complain.

> 3. It seems to me that using "//" for the usual case is syntactic
> overkill. Should it be reserved for the case where you are
> specifying a multi-component path w.r.t. a project, i.e.
>
> some/project//path/to/file
>
> but
>
> some/project/target

This might be possible. But actually, I don't have much problems with the 
current syntax, so can't tell if the change is necessary.

> > In fact, I almost regret that I agreed to change target-id syntax
> > based on subjective judgements. Apparently, what was confusing for
> > Ali was ok for you, and now you're confused about target-ids.
>
> In fairness, we never discussed the // notation; I'm not sure it was
> OK for Ali.

He said anything but "/" is okay. But the problem I have is not that we've 
arrived to a confusing syntax. The previous syntax was okay for you, and no 
other user has complaints. The change caused lot of discussion previously
and causing some discussion now, not to mention some coding. Maybe, it was 
better to just keep the old syntax. 

After all, we don't have any tests for main-target names with slashes, which 
amount to having no such feature.

- Volodya