Re: [Boost-cmake] Parallel Builds on Windows

Subject: Re: [Boost-cmake] Parallel Builds on Windows
From: Bill Hoffman (bill.hoffman_at_[hidden])
Date: 2009-02-07 23:18:24

David Abrahams wrote:
> on Thu Feb 05 2009, Michael Jackson <mike.jackson-AT-bluequartz.net> wrote:
> 
>> There are those in the CMake community that successfully combine "unix makefiles" with
>> the Visual Studio Compilers to perform parallel builds.
>>
>> http://www.cmake.org/pipermail/cmake/2008-June/022178.html  is one of the relevant
>> threads.
>>
>> Here is another thread that has some important information about exactly what versions
>> of gmake and others to use.
>>
>> http://www.cmake.org/pipermail/cmake/2008-April/021336.html
> 
> If that's the only path to parallel builds with CMake on windows, it
> seems like a very significant weakness.
> 
There are two paths right now:

1. the cygwin gmake (has to be CVS gmake ).  The issue is the jobserver 
code in gmake is only available in a posix environment right now.  The 
gmake that ships with cygwin right now can not handle paths with c: in 
them, but only the /cygdrive/c style of path, and the ms compiler of 
course does not know about /cygdrive/c.   The fix for this is in CVS 
gmake.   There are some KDE folks working on a windows solution for the 
jobserver gmake code that can be merged into gmake. Once that happens 
there will be a third option.

2. or you can use the visual studio project files with vsbuild or the 
devenv tool itself.

I use 1 most of the time for myself, and it is not so hard, but you do 
have to install the base cygwin package. Many developers at Kitware use 
2.  I really don't see this as a huge issue.  There are in fact two 
working paths for parallel builds on Windows.  However, I do think that 
the visual studio project style of build needs to be tested, and will be 
most commonly used by Windows developers.  So, relying on makefile only 
cmake for testing on Windows will not be a good idea.

-Bill