Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!cornell!uw-beaver!ubc-cs!eric!eric.mpr.ca!murphy
From: murphy@eric.mpr.ca (Gail Murphy)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.eiffel
Subject: Eiffel Automatic Configuration Management
Keywords: es
Message-ID: <1752@eric.mpr.ca>
Date: 12 Aug 89 15:29:35 GMT
Sender: news@eric.mpr.ca
Reply-To: murphy@eric.mpr.ca (Gail Murphy)
Organization: Microtel Pacific Research Ltd., Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Lines: 34

This newsgroup seems to be quiet at present, so let's see if anyone
else is interested in discussing the automatic configuration management
provided by Eiffel.

I have found that "es" is great for small Eiffel systems, but once
a system starts to become large, the time spent in reanalyzing
the system for small bug fixes (ie. forget to define an integer, misspell
variable name, only require re-link due to change in external C object)
is not acceptable.

I have tried to use "ec" in some of these cases, but have found that
it is more trouble than it is worth (ie. end up with strange recompilation
sequences occurring, etc.).

I have done some work in using Eiffel in conjunction with Yacc and Lex and
find it particularly slow for es to reanalyze a system when only the
Yacc and Lex code have changed, and thus only a re-link is required.

Has there been any though to providing an option on es that would
output some type of make file (this could be encoded to prevent changes).
If changes which the user though would not affect the order of compilation
or what needs to be compiled were made, es  could then be run from this
make file.  This would speed up recompilations from simple errors
found in later passes and for re-linking.  Of course, the user would
have to be knowledgable and understand that the resultant system
might not run correctly.

Any thoughts?


Gail Murphy                     | murphy@joplin.mpr.ca
Microtel Pacific Research       | joplin.mpr.ca!murphy@uunet.uu.net
8999 Nelson Way, Burnaby, BC    | murphy%joplin.mpr.ca@relay.ubc.ca
Canada, V5A 4B5, (604) 293-5462 | ...!ubc-vision!joplinmpr.ca!murphy