[postgis-devel]WKTRaster:WhyhavingtocompilePostgreSQL&PostGISfirst?

[Mark Cave-Ayland]

Mateusz Loskot wrote:

> Pierre,
> 
> I can't agree, unless a few details are clarified: system and building system.
> There is plenty of variants, even the popular configurations may vary.
> When it comes to report a problem, it's good to answer basic questions:
> 1. Is it Unix or Windows?
> 2. Is it Unix with GNU toolchain (GCC & autotools: Autoconf, Automake, libtool, etc.)?
> 3. Is it Unix with non-GNU stuff (ie. Solaris and its native compiler)?
> 4. Is it Windows with native compiler - Microsoft Visual C++?
> 5. Is it Windows with GNU GCC compiler?
> 5.1. Is it MinGW or GCC from Cygwin?
> 6. Is it Windows with yet other compiler?
> 
> There shouldn't be any need to (re)build PostgreSQL if you use Visual C++.
> Support (or lack of it) of easy configuration of PostGIS for Visual C++ is a different story.

Unfortunately there is with PostGIS if you use newer versions of 
PostgreSQL. Since PostgreSQL 8.3 is now compiled with MSVC, there is no 
way to generate the required PGXS Makefiles, and so you must use MingW 
to generate them.

>> 2) That it takes 20 minutes. The setup is very different on Windows.
>> All this is a Linux thing and you have to do a lot trial and error to get
>> it to work on Windows. Took me three days (and two nights).
> 
> I won't repeat myself, but MinGW should be banned as it's more a troublemaker than helps.

I think this is a little harsh; the MingW project does struggle due to 
lack of resource, but that is like most open source projects. In fact, 
if MingW hadn't been available, it is quite unlikely that the native 
Windows port of PostgreSQL would happened due to the invasiveness of the 
changes required.

While I appreciate that MSVC is a powerful environment for Windows 
programmers, I am not aware of any in-built tools that can do the same 
job as autotools. CMake could be a promising start, but until PostgreSQL 
makes use of it then we are stuck anyway because the MSVC-build doesn't 
generate the required PGXS Makefiles.


ATB,

Mark.

-- 
Mark Cave-Ayland - Senior Technical Architect
PostgreSQL - PostGIS
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