New subject: pike external module documentation

10 Nov 2003

      ...
The core modules are either built with a pike glue file, or if one
isn't provided, a two line glue file is automatically generated. /.../
Sorry, but that's not correct. You must be looking at a pike built
with static modules. They get a glue file to appear in the right spot
in the namespace, but dynamic ones don't need that.
...
True, and something that I shouldn't have let slip. It was copied from
somewhere within the pike tree, so somewhere there's a testsuite that 
has behavior that might not be so good test-wise. /.../
Some of the standard modules, e.g. Gmp, do that because they are
optional, so the main testsuite still works when they are disabled.
But that doesn't apply to third party modules.
/ Martin Stjernholm, Roxen IS
Previous text:
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2003-11-10 23:52:
Subject: Re: pike external module documentation

Thanks for the feedback... I will try to get the changes you suggested 
incorporated.
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Is it possible to build the docs for the module only, without merging
it with the system docs?
I hadn't thought of this, but it should be possible, though right now 
the build assumes the modref would be installed in the system 
documentation directory pikedir/docs/modref. Again, this should be 
relatively simple to accomplish.
...
What about pike only modules? Should be trivial, but it'd still be
nice if they too are covered by the standard tools so that they can be
handled the same way. Maybe it works to provide a standard Makefile
for that case, so that not even autoconf is required.
I checked some changes in about 2 weeks ago that should fix this. I've 
actually been testing on a pike-only module, and it seems to work just 
fine with a copy of pike from CVS.
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Doesn't work for modules with no pike layer. Also, the check works
better if it's a file which is very specific for the module.
That choice of filename was really just a suggestion; I assumed that 
the text following it would clarify that it would be wise to choose a 
relatively unique filename (i think i wrote that; but will check.)
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Btw, you seem to assume that there always should be a pike glue file
like that. Is it really necessary?
The core modules are either built with a pike glue file, or if one 
isn't provided, a two line glue file is automatically generated. I was 
merely following convention; whether it's a good or necessary 
convention I'll leave to others.
...
It should be enough with "VPATH=@srcdir@". (A while ago I cleaned up a
lot of vpaths like that in the module tree - seems to have been a bad
case of cut'n'paste back to very old code.)
I probably had that source file for a while, so i will fix this.
...
A bit odd example. In the testsuite for a specific module, isn't it
better to assume it exists? If there has been some major problem so
that the module isn't installed at all, one wouldn't expect it to
silently pass the testsuite.
True, and something that I shouldn't have let slip. It was copied from 
somewhere within the pike tree, so somewhere there's a testsuite that 
has behavior that might not be so good test-wise. I was mostly 
interested in getting the framework together. I agree that I might have 
picked a better set of tests, but was in a bit of a hurry when i did 
it. It actually might be nice for someone with actual knowledge of the 
testsuite system to put together a few paragraphs about it.
/ Brevbäraren