[CMake] Patch to apply! Changing the default name"CMakeLists.txt"!

[Brandon Van Every]

On Jan 15, 2008 5:15 AM, Martin Lutken <mlu at danware.dk> wrote:
>
> And can't see why you could nor set that option from the GUI also
> Before generating the makefiles.

One could, but as I posted previously, it would be a substantial
amount of additional implementation work to do slickly, and it would
have corresponding maintenance burdens.  Are you volunteering?

> I need it since I am trying to make a sort of "Common Build System" using
> CMake as make generator.
> The idea is to have a simple uniform way of building existing opensource SW.
> I know CMake allready goes a long way in this goal, but I want to go further
> by providing uniform CBS/CMake files for often used SW projects.

Why not just work on any of CMake's deficiencies, in cooperation with
the CMake community, and achieve your ends that way?

> Also I want
> it to be easy to create new buildfiles which works with the system so
> hopefully
> the project owners would keep them updated by themselves.

That means people will have to learn a build tool.  In principle, it
could either be CMake or your build tool.  But the CMake community is
scads larger than any community you will personally be able to develop
in the near future.  Even given the CMake community's size and
Kitware's commercial resources, we're recognizing the difficulty of
teaching people to use a new build system.  Documentation is a big
issue.  Do you have a better answer for how to document build tools?
If you do, we'd love to see that energy applied to CMake.

> Some projects might have their own CMake files allready (like KDE) and I am
> not interrested in intefering with these - at least not at first.

Are you sure you've correctly estimated the scale of work involved in
switching build systems, when a project is that large?  What's the
largest build system you've worked on?  Myself, I'm currently
converting a 400MB codebase from GNU Autoconf + GMake to CMake.  I can
tell you it's daunting.  If I am successful at getting these guys to
switch, I'd be surprised if they switched again anytime soon.


Cheers,
Brandon Van Every