Re: DEFCONFIGURE anyone? (fwd)

[Marco A. <ma...@pa...>]

> Delivery-Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2000 01:46:19 +0100
> Date: Thu, 24 Feb 2000 16:47:19 -0800
> From: do...@co... (Don Cohen)
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> Ok, I finally saved the file and ftp'd it to where I could read it.
> After doing so I'm still not quite clear on how this is meant to be
> used.  Does the downloading user define a configuration or does the
> developer?

The developer defines a DEFCONFIGURATION form, with some
defaults. What the developer defines, which cannot be changed by the
downloader, ia a set of logical pathnames which s/he can rely on while
developing and later on in distribution.  The DEFCONFIGURATION macro
generates a CONF:SETUP method which which can be called pretty much as a
'configure' script.

* (conf:setup 'my-system
              :library-location "/I/want/my/system/right/here/"
              :specially-defined-location "/but/other/things/go/here/")

So the downloader does the following.

1 - Starts up a CL
2 - LOADs the file containing the DEFCONFIGURATION form
3 - Runs the CONF:SETUP specialized method
3 - Runs other system building utilities (LOAD-SYSTEM, DUMP-IMAGE, etc.)




> How does this address the version dependency problem?

It does not and, I repeat, IMHO it should not.

> My previous messages on that subject were meant to allow the developer
> to define a version so that a downloading user could tell a tool (not
> yet built) to retrieve that version of that system and all that it
> depends on.  Then defsystem (a slightly modified version, also not yet
> built) could build it.  This seems related but I don't quite see
> how.

Yes it is, but not quite.  As I said, this is another dimension of the
overall developing space.  I believe this is a sorely missing tool,
and one of the reasons why the Lambda-Codex (Kaelin may disagree) is
hard coded on Allegro and on its specific way to do configuration
(i.e. implementation dependent logical translation file format - CMUCL
stores the LTs in S-Expr form, ACL as two-fields lines - and
location).

DEFCONFIGURATION aims to be a single new CL implementation independent
(let's forge a new acronym: CLII) utility for doing this sort of
things.

Cheers

-- 
Marco Antoniotti ===========================================
PARADES, Via San Pantaleo 66, I-00186 Rome, ITALY
tel. +39 - 06 68 10 03 17, fax. +39 - 06 68 80 79 26
http://www.parades.rm.cnr.it/~marcoxa