Re: Using vala in GNOME

["Gustavo J. A. M. Carneiro" <gjc inescporto pt>]

On Mon, 2008-06-30 at 15:25 +0200, Mathias Hasselmann wrote:
> Am Montag, den 30.06.2008, 12:30 +0100 schrieb Bastien Nocera:
> > On Mon, 2008-06-30 at 13:14 +0200, Mathias Hasselmann wrote:
> > > Am Montag, den 30.06.2008, 10:31 +0100 schrieb Bastien Nocera:
> > > > On Mon, 2008-06-30 at 01:51 +0000, Stef wrote:
> > > > > Interesting. That's a very valid concern.
> > > > > 
> > > > > Although this is a decidedly different case. Vala is used to generate C
> > > > > code for parts of seahorse. This C code is then checked into the
> > > > > repository, and included in the tarballs, so that people can build it
> > > > > without vala.
> > > > 
> > > > Right. Some of us have already been there with gob. I don't usually
> > > > think it's worth the pain, but it's your code. I'll start complaining
> > > > when I have to fix bugs in that code.
> > > 
> > > Just that gob wasn't half as ambitious as Vala. gob took some kind of
> > > minimum effort approach which lead to the effect that you were mixing
> > > high-level gob and low-level C code all the time. This just felt flaky
> > > and hackish.
> > > 
> > > Vala on the other hand tries to provide a complete user experience.
> > > Programming with it feels much better than it ever did with gob. Having
> > > written quite some C# and Java code I think, that writing Vala code
> > > feels as natural as with those languages. 
> > 
> > I'm not comparing featuresets. I'm saying it still feels like a
> > pre-processor. It needs native autotools[1] support before it's
> > considered for use in core components.
> > 
> > > While your rant has some justification
> > 
> > Just where you saw a rant, I don't know. I'd rather you didn't
> > attribute those kind of qualifiers to my messages in the future.
> 
> Update the bug:
> http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=472048#c11
> 
> The automake maintainers received a patch ages ago:
> http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/automake-patches/2007-09/msg00007.html
> 
> After that I've got the FSF's copyright assignment papers sent, and I've
> sent them back. No progress since then.

An excellent reason to switch to a more modular build system, one that
does not require patching the core in order to extend it.

Something like... WAF :-)

-- 
Gustavo J. A. M. Carneiro
<gjc inescporto pt> <gustavo users sourceforge net>
"The universe is always one step beyond logic" -- Frank Herbert