Re: [Plplot-devel] Aspirin for autoheadache

[Rafael L. <lab...@ps...>]

* Alan W. Irwin <ir...@be...> [2003-01-30 19:10]:

> (In the back of my mind I can visualize thousands of projects using this
> "echo autoheader ignored" workaround rather than putting on the pressure to
> get the stupid bug fixed.) But I hasten to add I also am unwilling to
> submit a bug report at this time because I simply don't have the time.

Please, do not submit a bug report to the autoconf developers, since there
is no bug here (see my last message).  Our configuration system and our way
to generate tarball is currently broken and my proposed changes will improve
the situation.

That "echo autoheader ignored" workaround is an ugly thing and I doubt that
people out there adopt it.

> Also, all sorts of X configuration is currently done in sysloc.in, and much
> like the python case I just completed I would rather use the automake
> macros to configure X to simplify what we do if that is at all possible.

This is a good idea.  We should try to use standard approaches when they
exist. For instance, why not starting using /usr/share/aclocal/tcl.m4
instead of that complete messy code for Tcl/Tk configuration in sysloc.in?

> Also, there is the issue of static drivers which seemed to fail on all
> platforms other than Debian. I will make sure they work both for RH7.3 and
> the limited solaris system I have access to, but after that I rely on the
> rest of the developers to test my fix (assuming the problem shows for one
> of those two platforms) on all your accessible platforms.

Unless I have access to a non-Debian system (which I don't) I cannot help
here.  The bug report sent by Doug Hunt to the plplot-devel is very terse
and I have no clue about the origin of the problem.

> Are there any other configuration changes anybody wants to tackle before
> 5.2.1 comes out?

One thing that we must try to achieve is to make "make dist" produce a
suitable tarball.  Otherwise, I have a couple of small ideas on how to
improve PLplot such that packaging for Debian (and probably for other
distros) will be much better.  By the way, I would like to merge the DEBIAN
branch into HEAD before 5.2.1 comes out.  I had hold on that because I had
to make too many changes to our pre-AT configuration scheme for Debian.

> Currently, I am thinking of releasing 5.2.1 on 1 March which gives roughly
> 4 weeks for us to improve the configuration and hammer the result with a
> variety of tests on a variety of platforms so we don't get egg on our face
> again.  However, that date is just a suggestion at this point.  If some of
> the issues I mentioned above take longer than expected to fix we may have
> to delay the release until even later.

I will be unavailable during part of February, so this schedule will not
suit me the best.  April 1 would be much better, but that may become
unacceptably late.

-- 
Rafael