A Windows Build Tree for MapServer

[Howard Butler]

At 01:10 PM 2/8/2006, Jani Averbach wrote:
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: UMN MapServer Developers List On Behalf Of Howard Butler
> > Sent: Wednesday, February 08, 2006 10:03 AM
> > Subject: A Windows Build Tree for MapServer
> >
> > Assefa and I have been collaborating on a unified build tree for
> > Windows binaries for MapServer.  This is a note to tell you what has
> > been done so far and to propose some changes to the nmake.opt and
> > makefile.vc files to streamline our build process a little bit and
> > make it work nicely with the build tree.
>
>This is a great news!
>
> > In any case, I have been working on a build tree at
> > <http://hobu.stat.iastate.edu/mapserver/build_output/assefa>.  It
> > contains almost everything for a full GDAL and MapServer
> > build.  Everything has been brought up to date.  Everything has been
> > built dynamically with /MD.  GDAL is built with plugins for SDE,
> > Oracle, and MrSID.  The intent is for someone wishing to build their
> > own MapServer to just grab the build tree, tweak nmake.opt to give
> > the path to it and do nmake /f makefile.vc and have it build up
> > everything all at once.  This is with MSVC 7.1, so it obviously isn't
> > for everyone, but I think it could go a long way in making it much
> > easier for folks to build things without having to worry about the
> > bazillions of little issues that crop up along the way.
>
>I would like to take this a little bit further and propose that we use
>VC project files instead of makefiles. This would make it easier to
>work with mapserver code base on windows and solve few problems with
>GDAL.  If you build GDAL with debugging (/MDd) and later turn the
>project to release mode (/MD) then you have very high changes to blow
>up the binary because the makefile system will mix debug and release
>mode binaries very easily.

I am a firm -1 against project files.  Granted they aren't as bad in 
msvc7+, but they still can cause a lot of grief.  I especially have 
trouble navigating the myriad of menus to figure out where to add lib 
files, etc.

I understand the runtime issues (/MD vs /MDd), but usually the 
compiler complains about needing NODEFAULTLIB which is a tip that you 
have things mixed up.

GDAL and MapServer have long histories of nmake makefiles 
(recursively, even), and those who maintain the software are not apt 
to change this, I think.  Another issue MapServer has is 
bison/flex/yacc-generated files, which cause complications as 
well.  Coupled with the fact that it is impossible to debug how a 
user is running a project file over email "no, click on the thing 
next to the other thingy in the option menu that you have to remember 
to enable", I don't see us changing at this time.

I like debugging in the IDE as much as the next person.  Getting the 
Windows builds to even use the same compiler options and layout 
is/has been a challenge.  Building MapServer on Windows used to be 
only for the most courageous, and I'm hoping to lower that bar.  I'm 
not ready to ditch the makefiles though.

Howard