References: FTP-Master report: http://ftp-master.debian.org/~aba/la/current.txt Squeeze release goal: http://wiki.debian.org/ReleaseGoals/LAFileRemoval Devel discussion: http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2009/08/msg00783.html dpkg-cross preserves (but mangles) the .la files in incoming -dev packages but Debian is working towards the removal of all .la files (or at least the removal of all dependency_libs values which is sub-optimal as far as dpkg-cross is concerned because if a .la file exists, dpkg-cross will still have to mangle it for no obvious benefit compared to just dropping it). Debian is therefore coming around to the point where static linking is basically unsupportable - Static linking is generally discouraged, ergo static linking support is expendable if such support gets in the way of more useful things, like binNMUs - which it does. So this raises issues for dpkg-cross: 1. Can dpkg-cross prejudge the release goal and remove .la files instead of mangling them? (Quite a few cross-build failures in Emdebian Crush 1.0 were probably due to .la issues, especially when those files were old / created by outdated build tools.) 2. If so, there is no point in dpkg-cross preserving the .a files either, presumably. 3. Is static linking (outside of bespoke kernel / busybox micro systems) of any benefit in the typical cross-build environment? The reason to do this is: A. It means that dpkg-cross only needs to modify the .pc file which then makes pkg-config support a potential target for fixing properly. B. dpkg-cross would only need to move files which makes Multiarch easier. -- Neil Williams ============= http://www.data-freedom.org/ http://www.linux.codehelp.co.uk/ http://e-mail.is-not-s.ms/
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