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Re: specifying multiple with arguments
From: |
Dan Manthey |
Subject: |
Re: specifying multiple with arguments |
Date: |
Tue, 15 Mar 2005 17:59:34 -0500 |
On Tue, 15 Mar 2005, Braden McDaniel wrote:
> On Tue, 2005-03-15 at 16:25 -0500, Dan Manthey wrote:
> > You're confusing the semantics of --enable-* and --with-*.
>
> I'm not.
Okay. It just seemed that --enable-foo=a --enable-foo=b setting
$enable_foo to only 'b' makes a lot more sense to me than the
corresponding use of --with-*.
>
> > --with-* is
> > intended to specify use of an optional external package and as such often
> > needs to have the external package's location specified (e.g.
> > --with-X=/usr/local/X11R6).
>
> CPPFLAGS, LDFLAGS are generally better for that.
Quoth the AC manual (node: External Software):
Some packages require, or can optionally use, other software packages
that are already installed.
[...]
The user can give an argument by following the package name with `='
and the argument. Giving an argument of `no' is for packages that are
used by default; it says to _not_ use the package. An argument that is
neither `yes' nor `no' could include a name or number of a version of
the other package, to specify more precisely which other package this
program is supposed to work with.
>
> > If you consider a "package" to instead be an
> > interface, say to a set of functions, it becomes sensible to specify
> > multiple implementing packages that each provide the interface (e.g.
> > --with-line-ui=readline,some-other-thing). I don't know if such an
> > interpretation is sanctioned by Autoconf, but it's well within the scope
> > of --with-*, in which case, it may be reasonable for --with-foo=bar,quux
> > to also be expressed as --with-foo=bar --with-foo=quux.
>
> Better, IMO, to provide mutually exclusive options and emit an error
> message if they are used together.
>
My point was specifially about situations in which the specfied packages
are _not_ mutually exclusive, so that doesn't pertain.
-Dan