From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (qmail 414 invoked by alias); 23 Feb 2010 17:39:23 -0000 Received: (qmail 393 invoked by uid 22791); 23 Feb 2010 17:39:21 -0000 X-SWARE-Spam-Status: No, hits=-2.6 required=5.0 tests=AWL,BAYES_00 X-Spam-Check-By: sourceware.org Received: from mailgw1.fnal.gov (HELO mailgw1.fnal.gov) (131.225.111.11) by sourceware.org (qpsmtpd/0.43rc1) with ESMTP; Tue, 23 Feb 2010 17:39:17 +0000 Received: from mailav2.fnal.gov (mailav2.fnal.gov [131.225.111.20]) by mailgw1.fnal.gov (iPlanet Messaging Server 5.2 HotFix 2.06 (built Mar 28 2005)) with SMTP id <0KYB00FQ61QO1Q@mailgw1.fnal.gov> for gsl-discuss@sourceware.org; Tue, 23 Feb 2010 11:39:13 -0600 (CST) Received: from mailgw1.fnal.gov ([131.225.111.11]) by mailav2.fnal.gov (SAVSMTP 3.1.7.47) with SMTP id M2010022311391330922 for ; Tue, 23 Feb 2010 11:39:13 -0600 Received: from conversion-daemon.mailgw1.fnal.gov by mailgw1.fnal.gov (iPlanet Messaging Server 5.2 HotFix 2.06 (built Mar 28 2005)) id <0KYB00L011ZIE8@mailgw1.fnal.gov> (original mail from amundson@fnal.gov) for gsl-discuss@sourceware.org; Tue, 23 Feb 2010 11:39:13 -0600 (CST) Received: from [131.225.82.237] (null-0016d3c40d53.dhcp.fnal.gov [131.225.82.237]) by mailgw1.fnal.gov (iPlanet Messaging Server 5.2 HotFix 2.06 (built Mar 28 2005)) with ESMTPSA id <0KYB00F1I2DA08@mailgw1.fnal.gov>; Tue, 23 Feb 2010 11:39:11 -0600 (CST) Date: Tue, 23 Feb 2010 17:39:00 -0000 From: James Amundson Subject: Re: Feedback from GSL folks on libflame 4.0 In-reply-to: <87aav0kit7.wl%bjg@network-theory.co.uk> To: Brian Gough Cc: gsl-discuss mailing list Message-id: <4B8412BE.10708@fnal.gov> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux x86_64; en-US; rv:1.9.1.7) Gecko/20100120 Fedora/3.0.1-1.fc12 Thunderbird/3.0.1 References: <4a00655d1002171047t4e87fb85w88b609245e3f9a8e@mail.gmail.com> <4B7D90B5.4020707@cs.utexas.edu> <87y6ipozqi.wl%bjg@network-theory.co.uk> <1266613086.27033.124.camel@manticore.lanl.gov> <87aav0kit7.wl%bjg@network-theory.co.uk> Mailing-List: contact gsl-discuss-help@sourceware.org; run by ezmlm Precedence: bulk List-Id: List-Subscribe: List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: , Sender: gsl-discuss-owner@sourceware.org X-SW-Source: 2010-q1/txt/msg00046.txt.bz2 On 02/22/2010 04:27 PM, Brian Gough wrote: > As Robert says, it's a question of standardisation. I have nothing > against cmake, on a purely techical level it may be better but > autotools is the defacto standard and that is worth more in practice. > I'm entirely sympathetic with the argument that existing standards are very valuable and may trump technical advantages in the end. I don't think the case for autotools being "standard" and cmake being "non-standard" are so clear, however. Let's look at the other mathematical libraries I deal with on a regular basis: 1) FFTW 2) LAPACK 3) PETSc ( http://www.mcs.anl.gov/petsc/ ) 4) Triinos ( http://trilinos.sandia.gov/ ) What do they use for build systems? 1) autotools 2) Custom makefiles 3) Custom complex build system 4) cmake No clear winner there. Let's look at some major components of my linux installation: 1) Linux kernel 2) GNU utilities 3) Gnome 4) KDE What doe they use for build systems? 1) Custom makefiles 2) autotools 3) autotools 4) cmake Of course, this isn't a detailed survey. I assume autotools would have the numerical advantage over all other options if a detailed analysis was made. The point is, however, that many projects don't use autotools and that a signficant number use cmake. I don't think the "standard" argument is strong enough to simply trump any technical argument. Of course, the technical argument still needs to be made. If you were to argue that the current level of predominance of autotools means that autotools is the only acceptable build system for GSL, I think I could make a similar argument that the current level of predominance of Fortran in scientific computing means that Fortran is the only acceptable implementation language for GSL. --Jim Amundson