[127391] trunk/dports/kde

[Ryan Schmidt]

On Oct 26, 2014, at 9:03 PM, Ian Wadham wrote:
> On 27/10/2014, at 12:10 PM, Ryan Schmidt wrote:
>> On Oct 26, 2014, at 7:10 PM, Marko Käning wrote:
>> 
>>> Ryan, any suggestions?
>> 
>> My suggestions are:
>> 
>> We try to avoid variant names beginning with "no". We try to use variant names that
>> mention enabling something, rather than names that mention disabling something.
> 
> No problem with that… :-)
> 
>> When there is a variant that aids in debugging a program, it is typically named "debug".
> 
> With all due respect, Ryan (and my respect for you is very great), please not this hoary
> old chestnut… :-)

I didn't realize this topic was hoary or a chestnut!


> Variants in MacPorts are global in scope, which means that variants like "debug" and
> also "docs" get applied to *every* dependency, back as far as Sumerian clay tablets… :-)
> With KDE and Qt having such a long list of dependencies, well…

Well, variants are passed on to *uninstalled* dependencies. If dependencies are already installed, they're not rebuilt with that variant. So if you don't want the variant passed down to uninstalled dependencies, install the dependencies first. For example, you could install the port normally first, without the debug variant, which would install all needed dependencies. Then you can reinstall the port with the +debug variant and only that port will be built with the debug variant.


> If I ask for "debug" I get a huge build and vastly more code-symbols and line-numbers
> than I really want for debugging at the top of the dependency tree.  Hence René's idea
> of "nostrip", which merely sets the linker not to throw away (strip) the symbols in the KDE
> part of the build.
> 
> With "docs", I get docs OK, but again with a huge build and vastly more documentation
> tools than I will ever use (e.g. the whole of TeX and several language translations), whereas
> KDE only requires you to run meinproc4, which is part of KDE (but thereby hangs another tale…).
> 
>> If the existing debug variant in the portgroup is not useful, perhaps we need to reconsider that variant.
> 
> Yes!!!
> 
> I have canvassed that once or twice on this list and there has been useful and
> informed discussion, but so far no action… :-(
> 
> I think all this needs is to make "debug" and "docs" exceptional variants in MacPorts, in
> that they are treated as applying only to the currently requested port and not to all of its
> dependencies…

It's probably not a good idea to have different base behavior for different variants based solely on their names. That's just confusing.


> Maybe, too, "+docs" should be the default for top-level ports, but not for all the libraries
> and utilities they depend upon --- if we can separate the sheep from the goats… :-)

It would be better to have *-docs subports, rather than +docs variants. That way users can install or uninstall the *-docs subports at will. For some ports' build systems however this is not easy to do.