[Qgis-developer] Wiki page/area for 'Building QGIS from scratch'

[Matthias Kuhn]

Hi John,

Documentation really is the way to go when it comes down to the build
software. Work in this area is very much appreciated!

The basic requirement for documentation is, that it's kept up-to-date,
maintained and concise.

Documenting the build process needs to take care of

* an update on any of the dependencies might trigger problems on
  other dependencies. updates on dependencies land all the time.

* different systems already ship different dependencies which require
  different measures when building other dependencies. this leads to a
  complex mix of system and self-compiled dependencies.

So we have two variables in here (variety of systems, changing library
versions) that lead to a huge matrix of possible combinations. Combine
that with the fact that both change over time. In my humble opinion,
this makes it a humongous task to properly maintain.

Normally, the way is that every project maintains the build steps for
their own software and provides a list of dependencies. That's what we
try to do here:
https://htmlpreview.github.io/?https://github.com/qgis/QGIS/blob/master/doc/INSTALL.html


I think it's best to provide information through inofficial channels

 * Set of scripts (for some preconditions)
 * Blog post written for one specific system at one point in time
   (documentation of what worked for someone)
 * External community wiki
   (that might be made official if it proves to be good enough)


What I see as the main risk for the project itself by starting an
official wiki for this purpose is that the information outdates quickly
and people blame "us" for inappropriate information. Unless there is
evidence that a wiki (for this or other purposes) can be maintained
better now than some years ago, I think this information can be very
well kept outside of the official sources.

Just my 2 cents
Matthias