[CMake] What are the missing features in Ninja that CMake needs?

[David Cole]

This "compare" view on GitHub shows the difference between the
regular/upstream ninja and the Kitware patched ninja:

    https://github.com/ninja-build/ninja/compare/master...Kitware:features-for-fortran

The ReadMe explains the high-level view, and says it is gradually
being worked into upstream ninja.

Looks to me like it deals with "implicit dynamically discovered
dependencies" in the Fortran sources. (i.e., you don't have to say in
the build system input what order Fortran files get compiled in, but
the order is important, and CMake analyzes them to figure it out.)

This change probably helps CMake communicate that info to ninja so
things rebuild properly as files get edited.

I can't tell from a quick glance through exactly what the problem
scenarios are, but I bet Brad King can reply with more info --
probably not till January, though. I saw a message from him Friday
signing off until then.


Cheers,
David C.




On Sat, Dec 17, 2016 at 9:24 PM, Daniel Carrera <dcarrera at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hello,
>
> Kitware maintains a separate release of Ninja in order to support Fortran:
>
> https://github.com/Kitware/ninja
>
>
> I kind of want to ask what Kitware changed, but I probably won't understand
> the details. Instead, I was hoping someone could give me a toy example of a
> Fortran program that cannot be compiled without Kitware's changes to Ninja?
>
> Today I tried to compare CMake+Ninja with Meson+Ninja and both were able to
> handle the toy programs that I threw at them. So I haven't found the corner
> of the parameter space that is fixed by Kitware's patches.
>
> Cheers,
> Daniel.
>
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