shindere
commented
1 year ago Calascibetta Romain (2022/11/02 14:27 -0700):
From a great discussion with @shindere, we invoke the
./configurein the wrong way: 1) we should not define our ownOC_CFLAGS
Indeed. Sorry for the lack of documentaiton about the conventions used
in the compiler's build system but, roughly speaking, the build variable
prefixed with OC_ are reserved for the build system itself. Overriding
them may break the build by removingflags which are mendatory. Normally,
it should anway not be necessary to override these variables because
every OC_FOO* variable is supposed to have a FOO counterpart which
is precisely here for the user to rpovide additional flags that will
take precedence over the private ones. If you guys happen to encounter a
situation where you are not able to override something you need to,
please let me know so that I can see how to best fix the compiler's
build system. This should lead to easyer-to-maintain code on your side
and a more flexible build system on the compiler's side.
2) we should call
./configurewith envrionment variables like:./configure LD=...instead ofLD=... ./configure
Yes, indeed. To phrase this in autoconf's terminology, in ./configure LD=... LD is a configuration variable and that's what should be
used. In the LD=... ./configure example, LD is an environment
variable and that is to be avoided.
See for instance https://www.gnu.org/software/autoconf/manual/autoconf-2.69/html_node/Setting-Output-Variables.html
From a certain perspective, this work is not really needed (because
ocaml-solo5already work for 4.14) but it can helps us to move forward about the OCaml 5 support.
It does indeed not seem important to backport such changes, especially given that the modifications of the build system you would rely on have been done incrementally so by backporting too far you would fall in places where the interface I suggested to use was simply not there or was there but not yet working properly, which is exactly why you guys had to do all the stuff you are currently doing. For the future, though, one can hope that, by using the compiler's build system as suggested you will be able to reduce the complexity of the set of patches you have to maintain. Also, forom the compiler's perspective, if you guys manage to do what you need for your use-case just by invoking the build system and withouot having to do weird things, it will demonstrate that the adjustments done to make the build system more flexible work as expected and do correspond to some real needs.
From a great discussion with @shindere, we invoke the
./configurein the wrong way: 1) we should not define our ownOC_CFLAGS2) we should call./configurewith envrionment variables like:./configure LD=...instead ofLD=... ./configureFrom a certain perspective, this work is not really needed (because
ocaml-solo5already work for 4.14) but it can helps us to move forward about the OCaml 5 support.