Re: debian/rules "make -f" restriction
On Thu, Oct 29 2009, Tobi wrote:
> But like Philipp, Lucas or Charles I believe, that the policy is too
> specific in requiring a fixed shebang line, instead of just stating, that
> debian/rules must be a Makefile which should execute itself when ran as a
> binary.
What no one has addressed is the wildly different behaviour
that this rules file has when addressed as ./debian/rules and make -f
debian/rules when one has the the "Magic" variables set.
If I ahve the magic variables set, and call it as
% make -f ./debian/rules,
I get the standard behaviour. If I turn around and call it as
% ./debian/rules,
I get totally different behaviour.
This is confusing. This is slick, and obfuscatory. By itself it
would qualify as a bug in my eyes.
What happens if we run the makefile through the shell script
with the variable set, but don't execute the filtered Makefile, but
save it? We now have two makefiles, one the normal one, the second one
which has been filtered through the shell script, but no more
on-the-fly mangling of a Makefile through a shell script that does
obscure things to the Makefile on the fly.
Actually, the on the run mangling of the makefile is cute, but
harder to debug. I do not see it as elegant, but has a clever hack
that makes things harder to read, really.
manoj
--
If pregnancy were a book they would cut the last two chapters. Nora
Ephron, "Heartburn"
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@debian.org> <http://www.debian.org/~srivasta/>
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