Re: utility programs used during build

[Tom Tromey]

>>>>> "Warren" == Warren Turkal <address@hidden> writes:

Warren> Is there any analysis on what it would take to create utility
Warren> programs that are only used during build in a crosscompiled
Warren> environment in automake?

Warren> I and working on the libX11 for Freedesktop.org and it builds
Warren> a file and uses it during installation, but does not install
Warren> it. I am under the impression that automake does not support
Warren> this right now. What would be needed to add support for this
Warren> feature.

I think your plan as posted on the patch list is a good start.

I always liked the gcc-style names like `CC_FOR_BUILD',
`CFLAGS_FOR_BUILD'; they always seemed the easiest to understand.
(Other folks have suggested BUILD_CC, BUILD_CFLAGS, etc.  Which,
really, aren't that much harder.)

Having a `build_' prefix for primaries makes sense to me.

For autoconf it would be nice if you could tell it "now I want to do
checks on the host compiler" and have it change the definition of CC
(and other flags), have a new build-specific config.h, etc.  The
required changes might be extensive.

I agree with Alexandre that we don't have to support target, just host
and build.  Well, really it might be nice to clean up target library
support, but I wouldn't recommend it unless you have a real need; it
is pretty messy.

Tom