Wireshark · Wireshark-dev: Re: [Wireshark-dev] Storing Generated Code in Git [Was: master 9079e3a: Cheat and try to fix the gen

[Evan Huus <eapache@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Mon, Jun 23, 2014 at 5:32 PM, Guy Harris <guy@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Jun 23, 2014, at 2:06 PM, Evan Huus <eapache@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> As far as I can see, the main arguments for storing generated code in git are:
> - not all platforms have the tools necessary to generate the code
> - generating it can take lots of time

I see four different types of people/groups building from source:

        1) people who just want the latest Wireshark for a platform for which there are no binary packages;

        2) people who want to build the latest Wireshark from source rather than trusting binary packages;

        3) people who want to do Wireshark development;

        4) people building binary packages for a release.

People in group 1 would, presumably, want a source tarball that requires as few tools to build as possible.

People in group 2 might, or might not, want that, depending on whether they trust the tools that generate source.

People in group 3 might well need to re-build the generated source files, as they might be modifying the source from which they're generated.  They could use a tarball as long as they're only tweaking existing C or C++ code, but if they're adding new code or modifying something that's used to generate other source. they're just like people building from Git.

People in group 4 probably could build from a tarball; if they don't want to do that, I have no problem requiring them to have *all* the tools necessary to generate the code or making the process take longer.

So perhaps what we should do is:

        not check generated code into Git;

        put all generated code into the source tarballs.

That works fine for me. I have no philosophical objections to putting generated code into a source tarball.