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RE: Building a snapshot


> I'm not sure how you translate not building in the source directory to
> "the configure file is not supposed to be used".

> The configure script isn't generic.  It's intended for building Cygwin.

> Once again: YOU ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO BUILD IN THE SOURCE DIRECTORY.

> That means you don't do this:

> 1) Unpack tarball.

> 2) cd to unpacked directory.

> 3) ./configure

> You need to create a separate build directory and run configure there.
> This is standard GNU stuff.  Nothing Cygwin specific here.

I've built a lot of GNU stuff, and most of it does use the 1), 2), 3) above.
Take for example the latest make:
---
The simplest way to compile this package is:

  1. `cd' to the directory containing the package's source code and type
     `./configure' to configure the package for your system.  If you're
     using `csh' on an old version of System V, you might need to type
     `sh ./configure' instead to prevent `csh' from trying to execute
     `configure' itself.

     Running `configure' takes awhile.  While running, it prints some
     messages telling which features it is checking for.

  2. Type `make' to compile the package. 
---

Even GCC allows doing that (but does not recommend), but I say it's rather an exception.
And for that, their building instructions include specific steps to use a separate build directory.

I'm not sure how you come up with the translation of what I said, that
"the configure file is not supposed to be used"...

> If this is still confusing then you probably shouldn't be attempting to
> build from source at all.

Confusing is that the README file does not provide a clue to call configure
from a separate build directory.  Quite the contrary, it shows that configure must
be started from the current directory, which is supposedly the top of the archive
(because no other location to do that is ever mentioned, and even if it was -- there
would not be any configure in that build directory -- it must still be called
from the top of the archive, i.e. using some path, not ".").  That's about "generic".

And I later posted that I followed the "no build in the source directory" rule, and it failed
just as ungracefully as the build I had been doing prior. I asked why, and no one responded
other than "it's how it is supposed to be".
Really?

Anton Lavrentiev
Contractor NIH/NLM/NCBI

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