Path: utzoo!utgpu!utstat!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!iuvax!rutgers!psuvax1!schwartz@shire.cs.psu.edu From: schwartz@shire.cs.psu.edu (Scott Schwartz) Newsgroups: comp.windows.x Subject: Re: Stupid Imake question Summary: Who needs it? Message-ID: <4331@psuvax1.cs.psu.edu> Date: 2 Mar 89 00:07:30 GMT References: <8902282128.aa17018@SPARK.BRL.MIL> Sender: news@psuvax1.cs.psu.edu Reply-To: schwartz@shire.cs.psu.edu (Scott Schwartz) Organization: Pennsylvania State University, Computer Science Lines: 34 In-reply-to: phil@BRL.MIL (Phil Dykstra) In article <8902282128.aa17018@SPARK.BRL.MIL>, phil@BRL (Phil Dykstra) writes: >Confusion over the use of imake is common enough that this is worth >spelling out: Note that this is because Imake is basically confusing, NOT because the people trying to use it aren't smart enough. >One limitation of the above is that you do need to have access to >the source tree on the machine you run imake from (since it gets >the imake macro files out of util/imake.includes and links to the >libraries and header files in the source tree). >For those of you that still avoid Imakefiles, I point out that you >almost ALWAYS have to edit a Makefile to successfully install new >software, but almost NEVER have to edit Imakefiles. ?? If the 2nd quoted paragraph is true, then the 3rd will almost never be true. Since 99 44/100 percent of the X11 installations either don't have the distribution source tree around, or have done a "make clean" in it, you not only have to edit the imakefile, but you have to decipher it to figure out what to edit. Not fun, not nice, and not worth it. The Right Way to do this is to use Larry Wall's configure program, so you never have to edit a makefile or anything else. >Try it, you'll like it. Sounds like a cigarette ad. In reality, the emperor has no clothes and Imake is quite a hassle. -- Scott Schwartz