Hi folks,
We cannot simply autoconf for readline for the following reasons:
(a) readline comes with two incompatible APIs.
(b) Apple's gcc reads /usr/local/include before /usr/include
(c) Apple's ld reads /usr/lib/libreadline.dylib before /usr/local/lib/
libreadline.a when provided with -L/usr/local/lib
(d) some users have an incompatible version of readline in /usr/local.
In other words, if you install the incompatible version of readline
available in ticket 10651 in /usr/local, I think you cannot compile
*and* link the following piece of code without redefining completely
the list of system includes, with -nostdinc. Which is the beginning
of a nightmare.
https://svn.macosforge.org/projects/macports/ticket/10651
#include <stdio.h>
# include <readline/readline.h>
int main(void) {
void* ptr = (void*) rl_username_completion_function;
return 0;
}
or this one:
#include <stdio.h>
# include <readline/readline.h>
int main(void) {
void* ptr = (void*) username_completion_function;
return 0;
}
I think it's time to wonder why we autoconf for readline (and other
stuff). At some point we decided that MacPorts (then darwinports) was
to support MacOS X only. (I was against this decision, but here we
are today; and considering that I no longer can install MacPorts on
linux boxes I have access to, I would favor the use or more MacOS X
technologies). Should we simply drop the autoconf options for
readline? Should we just determine what's the API version of readline
installed in /usr/? Should we keep users whining they cannot install
MacPorts because they have a readline in /usr/local?
Vincent: before you comment on this, I must say that I am not taking
into consideration the C*_PATH and LIBRARY_PATH problem. In fact, I
do not care about it at all, I am concerned by end-users not people
with a Ph.D. in computer science who are wise enough to know that if
they set these variables, it might break things and they need to
unset them before compiling base/ :)
Paul
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