[ros-kernel] midl compiler

[Eric K. <ek...@rz...>]

Hi!

I hacked the idl compiler to build properly on Windows. I also fixed the
preprocessor invocation for Windows. Flex and bison are needed to build
midl. A MinGW port is available at Jos=E9 Fonseca's MinGW site
(http://mefriss1.swan.ac.uk/~jfonseca/gnu-win32/index.html).

As part of the recent cleanup activities I want to move midl into the too=
ls
directory and rename it to ridlc. Renaming is needed to a) avoid any
conflicts with an installed M$ Visual C++ and b) to keep the Micro-boys f=
rom
complaining about stealing 'their' compiler and gpl'ing it.


For the past few days I was searching the net for alternative idl compile=
rs:

I found sidlc, which is part of the samba-tng project
(http://www.samba-tng.org). This compiler already builds a parse tree but
doesn't generate any c code yet. Unfortunately, there is a bug in a parse=
r
action that crashes it. IMO, the scanner and parser seem to be quite poor
compared to our idl compiler. Result: not usable and sources seem to be
unmaintained for about a year but the parse tree looks good.

Of course there is the FreeDCE project. They have a working idl compiler
which is based on the OpenGroup idl compiler. This is a DCE-RPC idl
compiler, not a MS-RPC (aka DCE-RPC plus M$ extensions), and will most
likely not produce MS-RPC compatible c code. IMO, the source code cannot =
be
GPL'd because it is still owned by the OpenGroup. Result: not usable but =
it
might be worth to have a look at.

Any complaints, ideas, comments?


Eric