Re: [Axiom-developer] Re: [Axiom-commit] SF.net SVN: axiom: [508] branches/wh-sandbox

[Waldek Hebisch]

Gabriel Dos Reis wrote:
> AX_FLAGS presents far less technical problems than ENV does; in fact,
> I would be very much interested in the problems you see with AX_FLAGS
> that is not present with ENV.  
> 
> I asked for technical reasons, the serious reason I have been offered
> is that "you dislike it more than ENV".  THAT reads "gratuituous"
> difference in my book.
> 

First, I see no problem with name: since we can not use ENV changing
it to AX_FLAGS is OK.  My basic objection is that AX_FLAGS is redundant.
We already have mechanizm to propagate values to subdirectories:
we use var-def.mk.  So AX_FLAGS establishes parallel chanel,
which has significant potential for bugs and confusion.

The problem I see in writing

make AX_FLAGS

(as opposed to)

AX_FLAGS make

is that we override thing in Makefile. But we are effectively
"broadcasting" AX_FLAGS down which looks like abuse of mechanizm
designed for something else (that is allowing default in
Makfile but sometimes taking alternate values).

The second extra problem is that AX_FLAGS is new code, so may
trick potential readers to think that its use is right thing
to do.

-- 
                              Waldek Hebisch
address@hidden