Re: GNOME CVS: gnome-core martin

[Owen Taylor <otaylor redhat com>]

Maciej Stachowiak <mjs noisehavoc org> writes:

> On 12Aug2001 06:48PM (-0400), jacob berkman wrote:
> > On 11 Aug 2001 20:56:54 -0400, Gnome CVS User wrote:
> > > 
> > > CVSROOT:	/cvs/gnome
> > > Module name:	gnome-core
> > > Changes by:	martin	01/08/11 20:56:54
> > > 
> > > Modified files:
> > > 	.              : configure.in 
> > > 
> > > Log message:
> > > Make -Werror the default.
> > > If you don't like it, use the --enable-compile-warnings=<something> argument
> > > to override it.
> > 
> > why don't you just export the CFLAGS you want to use in your
> > environment?  this way, you can have whichever warnings etc. you want,
> > and my build doesn't get broken.
> > 
> 
> If you really want a build to stay warning-free, you need -Werror to
> be the default. Otherwise, the few people who use it will spend too
> much of their time cleaning up after the people who don't. If someone
> really needs to build and can't fix the warnings, they can take the
> extra step of turning them off.
> 
> Not that I have any say on what the flags are for gnome-core - but
> I've noticed that modules which default to -Werror on generally have
> no warnings, whereas every gnome2 module that doesn't, gtk+ included,
> has a fair amount of warnings in the build, and build warnings tend to
> stick aroud long enough that I think most people who claim to do
> special cleanup passes to fix warnings are mistaken in their
> recollection.

The question is not really whether warnings stick around, but
whether bugs stick around.

-Werror:

 - Is somewhat of a wash for code quality. If you carefully review
   every warning, and carefully review your fixes, you probably
   make a net improvement. But careless squashing of warnings
   can easily introduce bugs, or put casts in the wrong place
   preventing the right fix from being made.

 - Annoys the heck out of me, and is probably worse for
   people on obscure platforms.

People are, of course, free to use -Werror in their modules, and
are free to put -Werror in their CFLAGS, and send us patches.

Warning suppression takes careful attention, and context switching
to do that when a build dies is expensive, even if you know
the code sufficiently well.

Regards,
                                        Owen

_______________________________________________
gnome-hackers mailing list
gnome-hackers gnome org
http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-hackers