Getting rid of build tools

[Pjotr Prins]

Hi all,

2015 was a good year for GNU Guix - Guix has made immense progress. Some
thoughts for 2016:

I am a software developer by trade and for years I have struggled with
build systems, such as configure/automake, cmake, Ruby RVM/bundler,
Python virtualenv etc. etc. You probably know I have already ditched
RVM/bundler and virtualenv for GNU Guix which is great :)

Recently it dawned on me that for programming with GNU Guix there is
no longer a need for configure/automake and cmake either! These tools
really try to address the problem of targetting different (posix)
build environments. If I only target GNU Guix I think a simple make
will do again because there are only a few final targets (test, debug,
install) and GNU Guix resolves all dependencies. This greatly
simplifies the task of the software developer.

I am not going to let tears over losing these complex build tools. And
being a Linux guy I am happy to only target Linux. The different
virtualization solutions make deployments on different systems quite
easy anyway and trivial with Guix because it comes with all
dependencies.

Even so, my prediction is that eventually other systems will be
targeted too.  Even though there currently is not much GNU Guix
initiative outside Linux/Hurd I think people will start working on
other ports. The Guix/Nix back-end already runs on the BSDs, for
example. So, it is mostly a matter of adapting the Guix front-end.

Happy hacking in 2016 :)

Pj.