[mapguide-internals] MapGuide open source builds

[Gabriele Monfardini]

IMHO the only viable approach should be to have the possibility to
build using free tools.

This because in this way it is possible to build from EVERY tool, with
a little effort.

Clearly more advanced features (installer creation and so on) may be
available only using some selected non-free tools, but I don't think
it is a good idea to cut user base with a non-free tool.

> and most serious Windows developers probably be running at least Standard anyway
... there's a lot serious NOT Windows developers out there ...

Building under Linux is incredibly tough and frustrating even for expert users
- It should be done as a superuser (very very unusual and not safe)
- it strangely goes to the end even if there are errors (that forces
to frustrating reviews of log files)
- many trivial and not so trivial corrections should be made manually
in some inner makefiles
- dependencies from third-party libraries are handled quite poorly
- there are some strange situations (i.e. it creates directory fdo-3.2
even if building fdo-3.3 inside)
- very often it does not complete succesfully even with standard parameters.

The fact is that all these problems have not been mitigated going from
1.2 release to 2.x.

All these situations may happen if a project is in 0.2 alpha, but are
not so usual when version have major number 2 (i.e. is considered
stable). One would expect to download the sources, configure, build
and to be ready to try.

Using a non-free tool to build the project obviously will limit
furthermore the adoption in non windows environment.
IMHO it is not a good result for an open source project.

Why don't use something like cmake (http://www.cmake.org/)?

My 2 cents,

Gabriele


On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 01:17, Jason Birch <Jason.Birch at nanaimo.ca> wrote:
> I've reversed my opinion on this one...
>
> While I think it's important that FDO/MapGuide build using Visual Studio
> Express, I think it would be reasonable for merge module and installer
> creation to require a non-free Visual Studio (I believe that Standard is
> the lowest level, and includes all of the setup project support that
> Professional has).  I'd imagine that most developers would be happy
> running the server from its build location, and most serious Windows
> developers probably be running at least Standard anyway.  This is a
> reasonable compromise between InstallShield (ouch) and NSIS (no MSIs).
>
> Jason
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jason Birch
> Subject: RE: [mapguide-internals] MapGuide open source builds
>
> While Visual Studio Pro may meet the project's needs for build/install,
> I would personally prefer a system that used free tools.
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