[Boost-build] Newbie questions

Subject: [Boost-build] Newbie questions
From: Boris Schaeling (boris_at_[hidden])
Date: 2009-07-12 18:43:53

I'm trying to get familiar with Boost.Build. I read the entire  
documentation and played around with Jamfiles in some small projects but  
still have a few questions:

1) Do I understand correctly that the project rule doesn't care about the  
order arguments are passed? For example the sample at  
http://www.boost.org/doc/tools/build/doc/html/bbv2/advanced/projects.html  
can also be written as:

project tennis : : : : : : : : : : : : : requirements <threading>multi :  
default-build release ;

The requirements and the default-build do not need to be passed as a  
second or a third argument. They can be passed anywhere. It's just  
important that the words 'requirement', 'default-build' or the others  
recognized by project are used to tell the rule what is actually meant?  
That said project is a rule with named arguments?

2) "default-build release" is the same as "requirements <variant>release"  
except that it can be overwritten?

3) Is the list of builtin feature at  
http://www.boost.org/doc/tools/build/doc/html/bbv2/advanced/builtins/features.html  
complete? I wonder as for example on  
http://www.boost.org/doc/tools/build/doc/html/bbv2/reference/definitions.html  
a sample uses a property <os> which isn't in the list. Or is <target-os>  
what has been <os> maybe in an earlier version of Boost.Build?

4) Does "non-free feature" imply that values are mutually exclusive? Or is  
there any non-free feature which could be set to two different values in  
the requirements of the exe rule (without bjam complaining)?

5) If Boost.Build isn't installed separately but as part of the Boost C++  
libraries, and if my project's boost-build.jam refers to the subdirectory  
tools/build/v2 of the root directory of the Boost C++ libraries can I link  
more easily to a Boost C++ library without putting a hardcoded path into  
my Jamfiles? It would be great if I could use a variable like BOOST_ROOT  
knowing that it is automatically defined and set by Boost.Build. I guess  
it would require Boost.Build to check if it's installed as part of the  
Boost C++ libraries so it can find out itself somehow?

Boris