Re: tarball builds

[Paul Eggert]

Stefan Monnier wrote:
> > > I have the impression that the same holds for Mac OS X and for Windows
> > I don't use either OS, but I do still use Solaris 10 and the default
> > installs on Solaris 10 (which is still shipping!) lack many developer tools
> > like Autoconf.
>
> But does it come with the other things we require (libgnutls, libpng, ...)?

No.

> If not, what steps are usually used to bring those dependencies?

I usually just configure --without-gnutls, etc.

> If they're usually brought from some kind of package management system
> like Fink/Macports/APT/RPM then adding more dependencies shouldn't make
> much difference.

I often deal with systems where those packages must be installed by people with 
superuser privileges, which I lack. Sure, I can (and do) ask admins to install 
or upgrade stuff, but there's often a delay involved. The delays can often 
stretch for months, due to concerns that the changes may negatively affect other 
users. (That's life in the big-bureaucracy world....)

Also, traditional platforms like Solaris 10 don't have some of those packages, 
even as options. So as a user I would have to build and install them myself, 
which would be an obstacle.

> For GNU/Linux, as mentioned, compiling the latest is easy because you
> just need a single command to bring in all the needed packages (no
> matter how many there are).

If only things were that simple! Unfortunately:

1. The "single command" is distribution-dependent. You'd need a different 
command on Debian vs Fedora vs etc., and you might even need a different command 
on Fedora 23 vs Fedora 24. This sort of thing is OK for the Debian, Fedora, etc. 
distributors (they can maintain their prebuild scripts themselves) but it would 
be painful for us to maintain all this stuff upstream.

2. The needed developer packages can sometimes conflict. Just last week I ran 
into such a problem on Fedora 24 where the x86-64 and x86 packages conflicted 
with each other and I was thrust into dependency hell. I regularly run into such 
problems on Fedora, and it's understandable because developer package 
dependencies are not debugged as thoroughly.