> -----Original Message-----
> From: Helen Borrie [mailto:helebor@...]
> Sent: Thursday, 27 July 2000 13:49

> At 01:32 PM 27-07-00 +1000, Adam wrote:
>
> >In my experience very few (proportionately) users of OSS on the Win32
> >platform will actually build it themselves, rather they will
> want binaries
> >and ideally an installer. Those who actually want to build the
> code are (or
> >will need to become) capable of using tools such as the ones
> Bill describes
> >in order to do so.
>
> IMO, we don't have any precedent to go on here, since previous OS
> databases
> have been Linux-only and the choice didn't exist.

PostgreSQL is hardly Linux only. It is also ported to windows. In addition I
cite the precedent of other cross platform OSS projects such as Perl and
Apache. While these can be compiled on Win32 it is harder to do. I suspect
that Interbase will be harder still.

> A
> multi-platform source
> needs multi-platform build platform options.

Which is what was suggested. Bill pointed out that autoconf could be used on
Windows but it requires some aditional (free) tools which provide a more
unix like environment for the build. For those wanting to build Interbase
from source that isn't a big ask I wouldn't think.

> It will be a mistake to assume that nobody will want/need to do a test
> build on Windows;

Nobody assumed that. I clearly indicated I was referring to a majority
position (on Windows) and clearly stated a possible alternative which could
meet the requirements of the minority.

> nor that those without access to a Linux box are
> incapable of using a build configuration tool.

Now I'm confused. Where did anyone say that?

Cheers
Adam