Re: [Traverso-devel] Build system updates, cmake

[Remon]

Hi David,

> Awesome, very very cool.

LOL, nice that you find it cool :)
I was a little afraid you guys wouldn't like it heh.

> I've also used the waf build system http://code.google.com/p/waf/ for
> small projects and have found it quite pleasant.  I write a lot of
> Python, so that is likely why I've enjoyed waf.  xmms2 uses waf, but
> it's a smaller and newer project and probably doesn't have quite the
> amount of support you can find for cmake.

Ah, never heard of it. I was attracted to cmake due it has become the build 
system for KDE4, so I figured if it's powerfull and easy enough for KDE4 then 
it's certainly sufficient for Traverso!
A previous attempt with SCons failed, too much python or whatever it is 
written in stuff :P

> Let me know when you have things we can test and I'll try it out on
> the mac.  My main setup is an x86_64 debian/testing machine (where
> /bin/arch also disappeared) so I can try it there too, though if it
> works on ubuntu I'm 100% sure it'll work just fine on debian.

Hmm, strange that /bin/arch has gone!
I'm still working on it, need to add a number of defines back, and add them as 
OPTION(), so they can be chosen from command line, or toggled via the gui 
(with ccmake on unix systems)


> Great work man.  While we're on the topic of build systems--I've found
> http://ccache.samba.org/ to be immensely helpful in speeding up my
> compile times (especially after doing a make clean).  Prepending
> "ccache " to the compiler name is usually all it takes to make it
> work.

Yeah, I've used it too. However, it has it's own set of problems (using cached 
files whereas it should have rebuild for example) and Traverso uses the 
precompiled headers feature.
With cmake I was able to just use one precompiled header, and the whole tree 
builds now in ~ 50 seconds (debug), instead of ~ 72 seconds :)
(On my system, dual core... I love it :D )

> With the new setup it could also make it simpler for specifying
> optional things to build (things that we previously would specify by
> modifying base.pri -- #defines and such).  

Exactly, another reason why I started hacking on the cmake build files!
With a consistent naming, it's very easy to remember and set the correct 
command line flags. (which look like 
cmake . -DWANT_ALSA=ON -DWANT_JACK=OFF -DWANT_DEBUG=ON etc)
Also for packagers, who don't need to sed files (basically the base.pri file)

> I believe it's possible to 
> have a simple script that sets environment variables and launches
> cmake.   The cmake system can then check the env. vars for
> enabling/disabling parts of the build.  

Yes, cmake can read env vars, very simple to do so!
I think I'm gonna love this system!

> Once we have things going with 
> cmake I'll see if I put something like that together.

OK, would be great!

Currently I'm trying to get cpack working, but it only creates empty 
tarballs :(
Hmmm, actually, for today it's enough, me starts reading a good book !

> Have a great weekend,

You 2

Remon