Re: [Boost-users] Building Boost question

From: Peter Koch Larsen (pkl_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-07-20 17:48:07

> Rene Rivera wrote:
>> Edward Diener wrote:
>>
>> First off... This documentation is being worked on. Thankfully not by
>> me, as I make a bad documenter in this case since I wrote the install
>> support.
>
> The general install instructions are very good. It is just this area of
> explaining where everything goes that I find poor, as if it does not
> matter to
> the end-user. It does matter since the end-user may well need to know
> where the
> build of Boost for a particular compiler ends up putting files.

Let me add that I too found the documentation somewhat confusing. I am a
Windows guy without any experience on Linux/Unix whatsoever so this could
explain something.
I wanted to build boost for Visual C++ 8.0 which is not by default
supported (according to documentation - i found the name after a long
search in the boost libraries). After the name was found, the build
succeeded but not without lots of warnings (mostly about deprecated
compiler options, if i remember correctly). It would be nice if the
location of the compiler configuration files were mentioned and there for
each configuration was an explanation as to any options that should not be
used and the rationale for that (if any).
Another minor point is that boost ended with an empty file called set,
located in the path I gave to the compiler. When I later did a "complete"
build you can guess what happened to every sourcefile that used std::set
;-). I must admit that i did not realise what happened and reinstalled my
VC 8 before i discovered my bug ;-)
This might sound as if Im dissatisfied with the documentation in general:
this is not the case, however. Generally it is very good - also the part
describing the installation.
>
>>
[snip]

/Peter