mjr@decuac.DEC.COM (Marcus J. Ranum) (08/27/90)
Hasn't this "why doesn't Cnews use XXX?" gotten a little far afield ? So what if it uses build, Configure, Imake, frogs, or sea otters - it's still trivial to build and install on a "reasonable" UNIX, if one reads the very generously provided directions. I'll bet I can configure Cnews for my system in less time than it took me to read through this thread of dicussion. :) My preference is to Keep It Simple - news doesn't need to be rebuilt every day, after all, and even the vast amount of effort :) running 'build' requires is tolerable. I personally tend to find "do it all automatically" installation and configuration schemes waste more time (to write, debug, and fix when they inevitably make some assumption about your system) than just going through the Makefiles and an include file or two with a cup of coffee and an editor would take. In fact, once that is done, the administrator has their choice of the many fine and wonderful tools available for automating it themselves, if they seem to find themselves rebuilding news daily. :) mjr. PS - this posting is somewhat biassed, since I just waded through some code that uses Imake. Never has so much software worked so hard to do so much to so many files - for the sake of saving 15 minutes it wastes hours. -- Eagles may soar, free and proud, but weasles never get sucked into jet engines.