Re: Why does autogen.sh throw away the config cache?

> I put that in there. It is possible that a change in the configure.in could
> invalidate the contents of the cache, so it gets deleted to be safe.
>
> For example, you might define a (cached) variable to be yes/no, but then
> decide later that it should be 1/0. You edit configure.in and run
> autogen.sh. That cache better be deleted or you're going to be scratching
> your head for a while trying to figure out what is going wrong.

Well, when I'm working on the configure script myself, I generally
remember to delete the cache file. (I just edit out the relevant
lines, usually.) It's never caused me problems.

But certainly, when someone else commits a change that invalidates the
cache, the poor fellow who gets an update shouldn't need to evaluate
whether to delete his cache. So I guess this makes sense.

> If you want to add an optional switch to autogen.sh to disable the deletion
> (the default "should" be to delete the cache), then go for it.

No, I think switches are a mess. I'll leave it as is.
Received on Sat Oct 21 14:36:09 2006