Re: Do we need "DEFINES=-DWIN32 -DGSL_DLL" in the Makefile of the gsl package?

[Tatsuro MATSUOKA]

----- Original Message -----

> From: "address@hidden" 
> To: Julien Bect ; "address@hidden" 
> Cc: 
> Date: 2016/9/6, Tue 03:22
> Subject: Re: Do we need "DEFINES=-DWIN32 -DGSL_DLL" in the Makefile of the 
> gsl package?
> 
> julien.bect wrote:
>>  Le 05/09/2016 à 15:47, Michael Goffioul a écrit :
>>  > The necessity of GSL_DLL macro is to deal with DLL-exported variables 
> (not functions) and MSVC compiler (and other compilers that use the same 
> dynamic 
> linking rules).
>>  > 
>>  > A DLL-exported function can be found by the linker using 2 symbols: 
> NAME and _imp_NAME. A DLL-exported variable can only be found by the linker 
> with 
> _imp_VAR. When using MSVC, if the variable is not decorated with 
> __declspec(dllimport), the linker will fail. When using GCC, the linker uses 
> some magic bootstrap to make the variable be found by the linker with VAR 
> symbol 
> only.
>>  > 
>>  > Keeping the define's is harmless with GCC (as GCC can deal with 
> MSVC conventions).
>> 
>>  Hi Michael,
>> 
>>  Thank you for the explanation.
>> 
>>  Would someone using MSVC tools be able to run the configure script (which 
> is need to create config.h and to determine @MKOCTFILE@ and 
> @canonical_host_type@ in Makefile.in) ?
>> 
>>  @++
>>  Julien
>> 
> In mxe-octave, one can see the descriptions for msvc build. Now it seems not 
> to 
> be  maintained. I feel that they are preserved for someone resuming the work. 
> At 
> that time. the description in the gsl package will be useful.
> 
> Tatsuro


Additional information.  

The description for msvc on mxe-octave include wrappers by which msvc cl and 
link behave like gcc and ld 
and additional tools to use msvc in the unixy autotools (automake, autoconf , 
libtool etcs). 

Tatsuro