Re: [Caml-list] ocamldep, transitive dependencies, build systems, flambda

[Goswin von Brederlow <goswin-v-b@web.de>]

On 05/07/2016 11:17, Nick Chapman wrote:
> There was a further issue we needed to solve to get our scheme working.
> Suppose library A lists library B as a dependency and allows this
> dependence to be exposed in its interface. Clients of library A will
> require access to the .cmi's of library B to be compiled but it seems
> unreasonable to require them to explicitly list library B as a
> dependency. We solve this by automatically running ocamlinfo on the
> public .cmi's of a library to discover additional library deps required
> by clients of the library.

Debian has a verry simple policy for dynamic link libraries:

    A library must itself be linked against any other lib it uses.

That way applications can just link libfoo if the use it and any lib
used by libfoo is automatically included as well. If libfoo changes
what other libs it needs then they get included without the app having
to do anything.


The same should work for cmi files. As you say the cmi file already
contains the info what other libs are needed. Ocaml should include
them automatically and ocamldep and the build system should not have
to care.

So I agree with you but want to go one step further. Don't even
automatically figure out the depends so you can add the libs to the
command line when linking. Have ocaml add them implizitly itself.

MfG
	Goswin