Jeff Garland wrote:
Stefan Seefeld wrote:
Pedro Lamarão wrote:
Benjamin Kosnik wrote:
Has any thought been put into releasing multiple split boost packages containing orthogonal functionality (boost.python, boost.wave, boost.serialization, etc.) ? Some. There are some intra-dependencies, and the split would add more complications to an already too-complicated build process IMHO. Ah well. Unfortunately not everybody agrees that boost is not modular enough. I've seen this discussion before, and never saw any proof of concept for
Stefan Seefeld escreveu: this modular release approach. I'm not sure what you mean by 'proof of concept'. Use cases I have in mind include:
* The ability to install individual components. * The ability to build a dependent component such that prerequisite components may be preinstalled or part of the same tree (say, on my FC6 laptop, I have 'boost.core' and 'boost.graph' rpms installed, and want to compile 'boost.python' from mainline). * The ability to run test suites for components, with all prerequisite components already installed.
I believe that having support for the above would make life for (almost) everyone much easier, since components could be developed, built, tested, and released (oh, and used ! :-) ) more independently.
There's all sorts of things that have already, and can be done. Everyone that wants a smaller boost can use bcp: http://www.boost.org/tools/bcp/bcp.html.
The danger here is to let users (and individual packagers) decide where to draw the line(s). As a result, package layout differs between platforms / distributions, making life hard for users. I think there is great value in boost.org providing guidlines about how to split, so users get the same, no matter whether they install from source, binary packages, or whatever. (Example: I'm developing an application using some boost components, and I want it to be portable, using make / autotools if available. What should I check for ? Even among GNU/Linux distributions this may vary wildly !)
bjam can already run tests for individual libs as desired.
But can it run test on one component that is being built against preinstalled prerequisite components ? I still need a full source tree, no ? And, it's not as easy as it could, so users refrain from doing it, so boost.org doesn't get as much help as it could.
On other Linux systems boost is already 'split up'. On my ubuntu system Boost has components for each 'built library', tools, docs, etc. Here's the relevant output of 'apt-get search boost'
Right, but as this split isn't christened by boost.org, other distros will most likely reinvent their own way. RH / FC packages right now aren't split, which is the point of my original reply.
I'd suggest that the RPM based distros might want to follow the lead of ubuntu if that want smaller granularity boost packages.
Thanks, Stefan -- ...ich hab' noch einen Koffer in Berlin...