Re: [Boost-users] Scons users?

From: Jon Stewart (stew1_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-09-13 11:29:47

> On the Boost.Build list we were just discussing the fact that some
> people otherwise inclined towards Boost have chosen Scons over
> Boost.Build.  It would be useful for us to understand some of the
> reasons why, if some of you wouldn't mind letting us know.  No flames,
> please!

I have been using Scons more for tiny projects* than for large ones, and I 
am still somewhat ignorant about Boost.Build, so I can't give a fair 
comparison. But people aren't fair, so I think the data points are still 
valid:

1. Scons is a nice framework embedded in a general purpose 
programming language. So, you get the benefit of a DSL that does 80% of 
the job very nicely, but you've got all that is Python for the 20% that 
doesn't fit -- and the two parts integrate naturally. I moved from Ant to 
Scons and liked that Scons provided lots of high-level functionality but 
didn't straightjacket me into abstractions that didn't fit my situation.

2. My standard SConstruct file is 4 lines (2 imports, 2 statements). I get 
a full dependency analysis, can make full use of ccache and distcc, and 
run my unit tests after the build. I can't imagine life being better. :-)

3. Boost.Build started out life as a fork (right?), and I haven't noticed 
many other projects outside of Boost using it. Scons seems to have more 
"momentum".

4. Boost.Build docs don't/didn't offer the trivial example of how 
to get "Hello, World" to build. Compare:

http://www.boost.org/tools/build/v1/build_system.htm#getting_started

with:

http://www.scons.org/doc/HTML/scons-user.html#AEN239

5. A fair amount of traffic on this list seems to be from people who have 
trouble with Boost.Build. Of course, I'm not subscribed to the scons users 
list so this isn't fair, but my perception was that Boost.Build would have 
a steeper learning curve.

I'm sure Boost.Build is a powerful system and can do the job... it just 
seemed to require more thought to get running the first time, and I wanted 
to devote my thought to writing code.

Hope this helps,

Jon

* The majority of my tiny projects are stub programs to play around with 
all the other Boost libraries! :-)
-- 
Jon Stewart
stew1_at_[hidden]