[HEADS UP] ar(1) front-end committed. (notes for cross compile)

[David O'Brien]

On Fri, Feb 22, 2008 at 12:16:42PM +0300, Ruslan Ermilov wrote:
> Here's the promised patch.  What it does:
> - Switch again to using BSD ar(1) by default, but provide a knob
>   to use GNU ar(1) as the system ar(1).  (Option WITH_BSDAR is
>   replaced with option WITH_GNUAR.)
> 
> - Install BSD ar(1) as bsdar(1) with the necessary links:
>   bsdranlib(1), ar(1), and ranlib(1) (the latter two unless we
>   build WITH_GNUAR).
..
> - ar.1 moved to bsdar.1 along with some bugfixing.

I don't quite follow what you want the end state to be.  If it is to
quickly convert to the new BSDLed ar & ranlib, then I don't care for the
"creatation" of a bsdar binary and manpage (below you delete
src/usr.bin/ar/ar.1 and create bsdar.1).  The FreeBSD 8 official 'ar'
should have its man page named "ar.1" - I don't see what is gained
otherwise.  bsdtar could be mentioned as an example where we went this
path - but I think bsdtar (and associated libarchive) has a large life
outside of FreeBSD.  I really see that for 'ar'.

> - Handle upgrades nicely: use GNU ar(1) during the build on older
>   systems, and use BSD ar(1) on newer systems.

If we need GNU ar for the upgrade path - then lets just install it (and
its manage) as gnu-ar and let that be that.

> Please review.

You asked...  8-)
 
-- 
-- David  (obrien at FreeBSD.org)