DeforaOS configure

About configure

configure generates Makefiles from project definition files. Projects are described through project definition files, named project.conf, and configure creates a Makefile for each directory of the project. They contain build rules, with dependency handling; they implement the installation and uninstallation procedure, the creation of source archives for redistribution, as well as the execution of test suites.

The Makefiles generated are meant to be portable and expected to work with any common variant, including both GNU make and BSD make at the same time. No additional tooling is required on the systems where the project is built.

configure depends on the DeforaOS libSystem library (version 0.3.2 or above), which is found on the website for the DeforaOS Project: https://www.defora.org/.

Getting started

A project is described by one project.conf file per directory, in an ini-style file format. The top file may contain the package's name and version, and an optional vendor name. A list of sub-directories can also be provided, as follows:

package=hello
version=0.1.0
subdirs=src

Targets can be defined anywhere, with a dedicated section per target:

targets=hello

[hello]
type=binary
sources=hello.c
install=$(BINDIR)

Run configure once from the top of the project, then build as usual:

$ configure
$ make

Besides the default all target, the Makefiles generated provide clean, distclean, install, uninstall, dist, and distcheck targets when relevant. Re-run configure whenever a project.conf changes.

Note: the Makefiles are generated, so they should not be edited manually and it is best to not include them in version control (e.g., list them in .gitignore when using Git).

What can be described

Targets can be of type binary, library, plugin, object, script, command, or libtool.

Sources can be C, C++, Objective C, Objective C++, assembly, Go, Java or Verilog, and are recognised by their file extension.

Makefiles can be generated for DeforaOS, Linux, NetBSD, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, macOS and Windows. The target system is detected automatically, or can be forced with configure -O <system>.

Documentation

The manual pages cover the details:

man project.conf        the format of the project definition files
man configure           the command and its options
man configure-update    updating the helper scripts of a project

Compiling configure

Please read the INSTALL.md file for instructions about how to compile and install configure.

Bug reports

Please read the BUGS file for information about known problems and planned feature upgrades.

Thanks for using this program. I hope it will be useful.