README-hacking

   1 -*- outline -*-
   2
   3 These notes intend to help people working on the checked-out sources.
   4 These requirements do not apply when building from a distribution tarball.
   5
   6 * Requirements
   7
   8 We've opted to keep only the highest-level sources in the repository.
   9 This eases our maintenance burden, (fewer merges etc.), but imposes more
  10 requirements on anyone wishing to build from the just-checked-out sources.
  11 For example, you have to use the latest stable versions of the maintainer
  12 tools we depend upon, including:
  13
  14 - Automake <http://www.gnu.org/software/automake/>
  15 - Autoconf <http://www.gnu.org/software/autoconf/>
  16 - Flex <http://www.gnu.org/software/flex/>
  17 - Gettext <http://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/>
  18 - Gzip <http://www.gnu.org/software/gzip/>
  19 - Perl <http://www.cpan.org/>
  20 - Rsync <http://samba.anu.edu.au/rsync/>
  21 - Tar <http://www.gnu.org/software/tar/>
  22
  23 Valgrind <http://valgrind.org/> is also highly recommended, if
  24 Valgrind supports your architecture.
  25
  26 Bison is written using Bison grammars, so there are bootstrapping
  27 issues.  The bootstrap script attempts to discover when the C code
  28 generated from the grammars is out of date, and to bootstrap with an
  29 out-of-date version of the C code, but the process is not foolproof.
  30 Also, you may run into similar problems yourself if you modify Bison.
  31
  32 Only building the initial full source tree will be a bit painful.
  33 Later, after synchronizing from the repository a plain `make' should
  34 be sufficient.
  35
  36 * First checkout
  37
  38 Obviously, if you are reading these notes, you did manage to check out
  39 this package from the repository.  For the record, you will find all the
  40 relevant information on:
  41
  42         http://savannah.gnu.org/git/?group=bison
  43
  44 Bison uses Git submodules: subscriptions to other Git repositories.
  45 In particular it uses gnulib, the GNU portability library.  To ask Git
  46 to perform the first checkout of the submodules, run
  47
  48        $ git submodule update --init
  49
  50 Git submodule support is weak before versions 1.6 and later, you
  51 should probably upgrade Git if your version is older.
  52
  53 The next step is to get other files needed to build, which are
  54 extracted from other source packages:
  55
  56         $ ./bootstrap
  57
  58 And there you are!  Just
  59
  60         $ ./configure
  61         $ make
  62         $ make check
  63
  64 At this point, there should be no difference between your local copy,
  65 and the master copy:
  66
  67         $ git diff
  68
  69 should output no difference.
  70
  71 Enjoy!
  72
  73 * Updating
  74
  75 The use of submodules make things somewhat different because git does
  76 not support recursive operations: submodules must be taken care of
  77 explicitly by the user.
  78
  79 ** Updating Bison
  80
  81 If you pull a newer version of a branch, say via `git pull', you might
  82 import requests for updated submodules.  A simple `git diff' will
  83 reveal if the current version of the submodule (i.e., the actual
  84 contents of the gnulib directory) and the current request from the
  85 subscriber (i.e., the reference of the version of gnulib that the
  86 Bison reporitory requests) differ.  To upgrade the submodules (i.e.,
  87 to check out the version that is actually requested by the subscriber,
  88 run `git submodule update'.
  89
  90         $ git pull
  91         $ git submodule update
  92
  93 ** Updating a submodule
  94 To update a submodule, say gnulib, do as follows:
  95
  96 Get the most recent version of the master branch from git.
  97
  98         $ cd gnulib
  99         $ git fetch
 100         $ git checkout -b master --track origin/master
 101
 102 Make sure Bison can live with that version of gnulib.
 103
 104         $ cd ..
 105         $ ./bootstrap
 106         $ make distcheck
 107
 108 Register your changes.
 109
 110         $ git checkin ...
 111
 112 -----
 113
 114 Copyright (C) 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009 Free Software
 115 Foundation, Inc.
 116
 117 This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
 118 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
 119 the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
 120 (at your option) any later version.
 121
 122 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
 123 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
 124 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
 125 GNU General Public License for more details.
 126
 127 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
 128 along with this program.  If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.