Re: [Vala] Platform-specific .vala code and 'make dist'

[Sam Thursfield <ssssam gmail com>]

On Thu, Jun 30, 2011 at 11:30 AM, Andrea Bolognani <eof kiyuko org> wrote:
> On Thu, Jun 30, 2011 at 11:21:41AM +0100, Sam Thursfield wrote:
>
> > Hi everyone
> > I've just run across an interesting and unexpected problem, which I'd
> > like to share in case anyone has considered it before or to warn any
> > future victims. In a nutshell:
> >
> > 1. 'make dist' generates a platform-independent tarball which can be
> > compiled on any platform
> > 2. Vala should not be required to build from a tarball, so the
> > generated .c files are dist'ed
> > 3. I have some platform-specific #if OS_BEOS, #if OS_WIN32 etc. code
> > in my vala source
> >
> > My dist tarball is therefore inconsistent, because to compile on
> > platforms other than the one that did the 'make dist' I actually still
> > need valac to regenerate the C files.
> >
> > Are there plans to drop 2) once Vala's plans for world domination come
> > closer to fruition? Or is platform-specific Vala code discouraged?
>
> The way I’ve worked around this when I found myself in the same situation
> was to segregate platform–specific code to a bunch of small C routines,
> using G_OS_* macros to detect the compilation platform, and calling those
> routines from Vala.
>
> It’s not the best way in the world, but it certainly works OK if you have
> just a little amount of platform–specific code. Which, since you’re
> using Vala and by extension the portable GLib library, should be the case.

I guess this is why I've not heard anything about this problem before.
Sadly for me, my platform-specific code is between D-Bus and the
Windows RPC system, and I'm sure you know how much simpler Vala makes
writing dbus code :)

Sam