Re: [perl #41168] graceful "no compiler" error message?  On Mon, 4 Jun 2007, James Keenan via RT wrote:

> On Fri Jun 01 09:29:18 2007, chromatic  at wgz.org wrote:
> > This patch is very close.  Instead of handling compilation manually, I
> > recommend instead using cc_gen() and cc_build() from
> > Parrot::Configure::Step.
> > See config/auto/sizes.pm for an example.

> Can you explain why using these functions would be the better course?  In particular, how 
> would this approach square with the criticism Andy Spieherty made earlier in this thread on 
> March 21:
> 
> > + unless ( eval { cc_build(); 1 } ) {
> > + warn "Compilation failed with '$cc'\\n";
> > + exit 1;
> > + }
> 
> > This has two problems. First, it ignores the return value of cc_build(). 
> > That's understandable at the moment since cc_build doesn't seem to have a 
> > documented return value. It should, of course.

I agree with chromatic -- I'd simply add that the cc_build() function 
should be improved to have a meaningful return value, not that it should 
be avoided.

-- 
    Andy Spieherty		spiehera@lafayette.edu

