a) create a directory structure outside of the boost tree which looks like:
mylib build include src doc html docbook(maybe) boostbook(maybe) quickbook(maybe) test results ...
b) a set of simple tools which 1) can build the library in the src directory 2) can translate quick/boost/doc book to html and place it in that directory 3) run each test in the test directory and add a record to the test/results/... log file which I will either just lookat or post process locally to my personal taste.
c) what I don't need 1) tracking dependencies - I want to do this for on library I might be experimenting with. I can do this by hand. 2) I don't need to have my boost tree updated - in fact I want to know that I haven't changed it by just running a simple tool
d) current tools: 1) presume that a library is part of the boost directory structure. So the documents show up somewhere in the boost tree. Note when I build the documents on my local boost release image I get pointers to the boost sandbox or on sourceforge.net or whatever. So for boostbook->html would like to be able to say boostbook2html -in <boostbookdir> -out <htmldirectory> or something simple like this. 2) the only way I've found to use the current tools is to create directories in my local boost release tree with my "experimental" library and run bjam. There are two problems with this i) I have to make a jamfile which might be more complicated that first meets the eye ii) I mucks up my boost release tree. iii) it I get something wrong, it fails deep within some bjam script which is extremely difficult to figure out. iv) For an example to iii) above, I had tweaked userconfig.v2 to include the name of my xsltproc program which was found through the path. Later I elimnated the directory of the xsltproc from my path. Later I found I couldn't build my library or run any tests. Turned out that bjam stopped when it failed to find the xsltproc program - even though it wasn't being used. I'm not critisizing bjam. I think it's impossible to make a program as ambituous as this totally perfect. But I question the need for such an elaborate tool for doing what seems to me should be something simple.
Of course, I can do this myself - and likely will end up doing so. But:
a) I've got other stuff to do b) I can't believe I'm the only one who needs this c) I think that boost tools are "too automatic" for my purposes. I understand the motivation for building all of boost. But for what I want to do it adds a huge layer of "conceptual overhead" that I have to wade through.
Before I invest effort in this perhaps there's a way of using existing tools that I'm not aware that get's me closer to what I want and need.
For sure - take a look at the "example" project in the sandbox - it should do more or less all that you want - you just need BOOST_ROOT set in your environment to point to an existing Boost tree so that bjam commands will "work". HTH, John.