Compiling ORBit is fun, isn't it?

[Michael Hudson <mwh21 cam ac uk>]

The build process for ORBit seems to require a good deal of coaching,
which is irritating if you want to write a script to automate building
gnome.

1) My usual routine is to type
./autogen.sh --disable-static && make clean && make
This fails for a bundle of reasons.
1.1) I get messages about not finding the static library for libIDL.la.
OK, I can cope with that, take --disable-static out. Still, I *like*
shared libraries (I'm running out of hard disk). Is there a good reason
for this?

1.2) make clean is broken when the directory is clean anyway.
Something in `test' depends on something that is built into `src'. This is
fine if ORBit is built, but not if it isn't.
Does that make sense?
This would seem to be (after poring over make -d|less) because `Makefile'
depends on $(BUILT_SOURCES), and BUILT_SOURCES contains `echo.h', which is
built from `echo.idl' by $(top_builddir)/src/idl-compiler/orbit-idl. This
will not exist if the directory was not built up.

O look: (from the automake docs)
"   Note that, in some cases, `BUILT_SOURCES' will work in somewhat
suprising ways.  In order to get the built sources to work with
automatic dependency tracking, the `Makefile' must depend on
`$(BUILT_SOURCES)'.  This can cause these sources to be rebuilt at what
might seem like funny times."

I don't really see a way around this problem; maybe someone who knows more
about automake than me could suggest a solution...

2) There was a 2 but I've rambled on so long that it seems to have been
fixed in CVS while I was writing the above...

Keep up the good work...

Michael Hudson
Jesus College
Cambridge
mwh21@cam.ac.uk