[Buildroot] [PATCH] pkg-infra: limit -reconfigure and -rebuild actions

[Samuel Martin]

Hi all,

Here, I'll try to sum up what we talked few days ago on the IRC
channel, plus give my opinion about this.

To be honest, the first time i tried these -reconfigure and -rebuild
targets, I was surprised they didn't behave as I would expect from
targets named like that, rebuilding not only the package but the
images too. So, I keep doing things by hands... though I understand
why things were implemented like this.

IMO, for anyone who wants to re-{configure,build} a package, there are
several use cases (some of these have already been mentioned in this
thread):
1) integrate a (new) package in BR;
2) experimenting, on the target, the result of modifications in the
source code of a package;
3) add a new package in an image.

IMO, goals 3) is the combination of the first 2 ones, though it's
often the first thing coming in mind.

Because of what BR is, people working with it may follow one or
another of these goals:
- people working on targets and what the target will do at the end
mostly aims goal 2) or 3) (or both!);
- people working on BR, considering it as a distribution (working on
the package integration/upgrade, the infrastructure, etc) focus on 1).

So, depending on the end goal, the expected behavior of the make
targets '-reconfigure' and '-rebuild' may differ:
- for the goal 1) followers: these targets should only rebuild the
given package;
- for the goals 2) and/or 3) followers: these targets should, not only
rebuild the given package, but also the whole regenerate the whole
image.

I'd like 4 targets in BR:
- "-rebuild-single": re-building and re-installing only the given package;
- "-reconfigure-single": re-configuring the given package, then
running 'make <pkg>-rebuild-single';
- "-rebuild-all": running: 'make <pkg>-rebuild-single all';
- "-reconfigure-all": running: 'make <pkg>-reconfigure-single all';

The name of these targets may differ, but the semantic is here.


2012/7/21 Richard Braun <rbraun at sceen.net>:
> On Sat, Jul 21, 2012 at 02:54:11PM +0200, Thomas Petazzoni wrote:
>> However, I don't agree with the change you did on -reconfigure that
>> would only to the configure step. If -rebuild does build+install, then
>> -reconfigure should do configure+build+install.
>
> Right, after a bit more thinking, I agree.
Of course, I second.


Cheers,

-- 
Sam