From: arjen@...
Date: 2000-11-24T18:27:55+09:00
Subject: [ruby-talk:6570] Ruby/C extension build question

Hi all,

I'm working on an extension for the GDCHART (http://www.fred.net/brv/chart/) 
module, so that you can create pretty graphs and charts from within Ruby.  I have some
*very* basic stuff working (i.e. I can create a graph from some data
using all the defaults without SEGV's :), and I'm a bit stuck with the mkmf
stuff (extconf.rb).

Basically, I want to distribute the extension with the 'gd' and 'gdchart' C 
libraries included to make a completely self-contained extension like the  Python gdchart
interface.  The 'gd' and 'gdchart' libraries will live in subdirectories in the source
dist.

Question: is it possible (from with in extconf.rb) to add the libgd.a/
libgdchart.a targets to the resulting Makefile so it will build those
libraries first?

I've been working with Ruby for less than a week now, and the extension started working
withing 8 hours after I got the idea for making this extension (2 days ago), so I'm not
really versed in all this stuff yet :-)

As this is my first post to this list, I'd like to thank Matz for creating
a great language (I recently got fed up with Perl and tried Python, but didn't
really like it), and the Pragmatic Programmers for bringing out ProgRuby at
*exactly* the right time (and for PragProg too :-)

If all goes well I'll put the first (alpha) version of Ruby/GDchart on my 
website for download (and add it to the RAA).

Thanks,

Arjen

--
Arjen Laarhoven                         |
Email: Home: arjen@aragorn.demon.nl     |
       Work: arjen@murphy.nl            |
Web: http://www.aragorn.demon.nl        | All that is gold does not
glitter...