Re: Emacs-devel Digest, Vol 52, Issue 61

[Eric S. Raymond]

Eli Zaretskii <address@hidden>:
> > Date: Sat, 7 Jun 2008 09:20:37 -0400
> > From: "Eric S. Raymond" <address@hidden>
> > 
> > Whoever said expecting builds in CVS to work consistently was
> > "hopelessly unrealistic" is simply revealing that the Emacs system
> > is broken as designed.
> 
> This is free software: you are welcome to fix whatever you think is
> broken.

Yeah, like I wouldn't get flamed to fare-thee-well if I shot autotools
through the head and replaced it with something like scons -- which is
only part of what needs to happen.  What we have here is a mess compounded
of the limitations of CVS, Makefiles, and configure, with a semi-infinite
number of layers of historical cruft layered over all three.

The real problem here isn't technical, it's cultural.  This crew is way
too used to rusty, broken, archaic tools like CVS and the high hassle
costs that go with them.  Until that changes, fixing the mess will
be theoretically conceivable but politically impossible.
-- 
                <a href="http://www.catb.org/~esr/";>Eric S. Raymond</a>