Re: GnuTLS for W32

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

Eli Zaretskii writes:
 > > Óscar Fuentes writes:
 > > 
 > >  > If, at run time, you can find the elisp packages downloaded by
 > >  > package.el, what's the problem with finding a dll on the same directory
 > >  > (or a subdirectory of it, if you wish) ?
 > > 
 > > None, AFAICS.  That's (actually, a sibling directory) is what XEmacs
 > > does[1], and what Python does (same directory, if desired).
 > 
 > Please don't say that without telling the details.  There are people
 > reading this thread who don't know enough about Windows and are likely
 > to take this at face value.
 > 
 > Once again: the way the current C code is written, Emacs _cannot_ load
 > DLLs except from directories which Windows searches for dynamic
 > libraries.

OK, you may be right (I mean, for XEmacs too, I concede your expertise
on Emacs).  I don't understand the ins and outs of the Windows native
build, but it looks like support for a configurable modules directory
was removed from that port of XEmacs after 21.4 (which was when I was
reasonably familiar with the port), and what actually happens now is
that modules built at XEmacs build time are installed in the same
directory as the XEmacs binary.  It's quite possible the alleged
support was removed because it didn't actually work for the reasons
you give.

I don't know the details, but I'm pretty sure that Python does support
DLLs anywhere that a .py can be found, though, because where something
lives on PYTHONPATH is essential to figuring out what its name (as a
module in Python) is.

 > > [1]  Except that we don't provide DLLs for download, for various
 > > reasons, the most important of which is that binary distributions are
 > > bug magnets that distract the maintainers disproportionately, and
 > > non-maintainers are generally unwilling to touch.
 > 
 > That point was made in this thread more than once, but Ted is still
 > pushing for it.  Which is fine by me, assuming that someone will step
 > forward and do the job.

In my experience, such volunteers are only reliable in the long run if
they're paid to support Emacs by building installers etc.  But it's a
new year, so anything could happen!  Good luck finding the volunteer!