cottrell@NBS-VMS (03/26/85)
/* Kim Walden writes about mkmf... > Unfortunately, mkmf generates wrong dependencies, in most cases, > when generated files are involved. It would probably help to manually make the program first, so that all needed files exist. > I would hardly call standard use of yacc or lex as 'fancy' by > any meaning of the word. The first program a unix novice learns is probably cat or ls. The last is most likely yacc. Also, most files get compiled from j.x to j.o, (where j is the name and x is the language suffix) then collected with other .o's & maybe a few libraries to form one or more executables. Yacc & Lex go thru an extra step. Even make gets confused about this. > Almost correct is not good enough when hundreds or thousands of > dependencies are generated. If you have to make manual corrections > after each dependency generation, the whole point is missed. Okay, the alternative is do it by hand. Half a job is better than none. You can't automate EVERYTHING! Most of the dogwork (of doing it by hand) is probably tracing #included files. Default suffix rules & special cases should be a small part. No program can automatically know which libraries to include or what ld options to use by looking at the source. I have never used mkmf, I am commenting on your comments in general. jim cottrell@nbs */