'dynamic' options questions

[Stijn Hoop]

Hi,

I notice that there is a trend towards having ports autodetect software
dependencies. While I appreciate this in the (common) desktop case, this does
lead to some IMHO nasty inconsistencies while building packages to use for
other computers; the order in which the ports get built interferes, or could
even disable functionality while later on the 'correct' dependencies are
installed.

One such example that I just saw today, is net/gaim. From the Makefile:

%%%
.if ${HAVE_GNOME:Mevolutiondataserver}!=""
USE_GNOME+=     evolutiondataserver
PLIST_SUB+=     EVO=""
.else
CONFIGURE_ARGS+=--disable-gevolution
PLIST_SUB+=     EVO="@comment "
.endif
%%%

Again, I do appreciate the idea behind this as I'm sure that users with
evolution installed, who then proceed to install gaim using the port, will be
pleased to see that they neatly blend functionality.

In my package build jail this backfires though. And in this case there isn't
even an option to turn the support on. And I think dosirak or pointyhat (which
is it these days?) will never build support for evolution into gaim, right?

So, I guess what I'm asking is:

- what's the 'correct' way of doing auto-dependencies
- is the form in which there is no way of forcing such a dependency a bug
  (ie can I send-pr this example and any others I come across)

And maybe even generalizing this to:

- why are things like this off by default? (because in the common desktop case
  optimizing for size and gaining a few tens of MB is not really necessary
  IMHO)

Thoughts?

--Stijn

-- 
There are of course many problems connected with life, of which some of
the most popular are 'Why are people born?', 'Why do they die?', and
`Why do they spend so much of the intervening time wearing digital
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