From: Kaspar Schiess <eule@...>
Date: 2004-06-01T19:59:15+09:00
Subject: Re: [ANN] RMagick available on Windows

Hello Carl,

Carl Youngblood wrote:

> I don't really see why.  In unix-based systems the compiler is taken for 
> granted.  Many current ruby modules require compilation to work and just 
> assume that it's there.  Hence, the average windows user is stuck if a 
> module he wants requires compilation.  He can compile manually, but this 
> is too tedious or difficult for a lot of people.  The RubyGems paradigm 
> sort of solves the problem but most windows-compatible gems seem to only 
> go so far as to provide occasional binary releases.  Making an installed 
> compiler one of the RubyGems dependencies seems like a great way to make 
> ruby programming more seamless on windows.  Alternatively, it might be a 
> nice option to add to the ruby windows installer.
> 
> Carl

This is a reasonable request for most extensions that are just 
implementations of stuff in c; This extension right here is somewhat 
special in that there are about 10+ libraries attached (compiled and 
linked in) that are by themselves really not very pretty to get to 
build. So that automatic compiler of yours would need to automatically 
resolve all the platform issues that arise when compiling unix libraries 
on win32 and resolve them (sometimes by changing source code or 
configure scripts). I guess that goes too far indeed.

Downloading a binary built for this one is much more convenient. 
Provided it works on your system. And we are really saving time this way.


-- 
kaspar

semantics & semiotics
code manufacture

www.tua.ch/ruby