More on boost jam problems with minGW

From: ANDREW MARLOW, BLOOMBERG/ LONDON OF (amarlow1_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-06-07 03:17:22

RR> From: Rene Rivera <jamboost_at_[hidden]>
RR> >>>>I am struggling to get a version of
RR> >>>>boost jam built for mingw.
RR> >>>>build.bat gcc-nocygwin produces
RR> > 
RR> > I don't have MinGW installed right now, but 
RR> > the following was working last I checked:
RR> 
RR> > set BOOST_JAM_TOOLSET_ROOT=C:\MinGW
RR> 
RR> Oops that should be "set BOOST_JAM_TOOLSET_ROOT=C:\MinGW\" - Note the 
RR> "\" at the end.
RR> 
RR> > cd boost-root/tools/build/jam_src
RR> > build mingw
RR> 
RR> And I tried it and builds just fine, at least the version in CVS.

That's right, it does build just fine.
However, it doesn't work properly in a minGW environment
because when jam uses itself to rebuild itself it
uses build.jam with the NT flag turned on.
This causes jam to be built with rules that
employ DOS-style commands where it should be
using Unix-style commands. minGW gets confused
by the DOS-isms and this causes pathname and command errors.

RR> So Andrew, what specifically are you having problems with? 

After the compilations have finished (yes, that part works)
it tries to create an archive but uses a DOS command to do it.
It fails because it is given a Unix-style pathname and the
pathname separator is mis-interpreted.
Also, when jam issues the delete command it uses the
command "del /f/q filename" instead of using the
minGW command "rm". The del command gets confused
by the use of the unix pathname separator.

RR> What errors do you get? 

"Parameter value not corrrect".
This is caused by the archive command seeing the first unix-style
pathname separator and treating it as a command line option
to the library archive command.

RR> What commands are you using? 

jam lib

RR> Which shell are you using? 

msys

RR> Which version of MinGW? 

MinGW-3.2.0-rc-3.exe

RR> Which version of Boost? etc.

boost 1.32.0