Re: [Caml-list] Interface(.mli) location

[moosotc@gmail.com]

David Allsopp <dra-news@metastack.com> writes:

> moosotc@gmail.com wrote:
>> David Allsopp <dra-news@metastack.com> writes:
>> > moosotc@gmail.com wrote:
>> >> Gabriel Scherer <gabriel.scherer@gmail.com> writes:
>> >>
>> >> > It is correct that ocamldep assumes that the .ml and .mli of a
>> >> > given module are at the same place, but this is not the case for
>> >> > the rest of the compilation chain, which is either concerned with
>> >> > single source files (a .ml file or a .mli file) or with
>> >> > "compilation units" (a .cmo and .cmi files passed together,
>> >> > independently of where their source files were). In particular, all
>> >> > type-checking tools do look in -I directories to find .cmi files
>> >> > for the dependencies of the module being compiled (and at this stage
>> they do not care for .mli files).
>> >>
>> >> But the script seems to (somewhat) contradict this, i.e. after
>> >> `ocamlc -I d -c a.ml' ocamlc ignores the presence of .mli inside
>> >> subdirectory d/, producing both .cmi/.cmo when when compiling a.ml.
>> >
>> > The -I option specifies extra directories for compiled files only, so
>> > it's correct that the compiler ignores d/a.mli.
>> 
>> After sending the first post I've realized that: ocamlc -c d/a.mli was
>> forgotten, but even after adding that to the script things do not change,
>> i.e. following compilation of a.ml with -I d where d contains a.cmi still
>> produces both a.cmo and a.cmi in the top-level directory.
>
> Indeed - but that's the correct documented behaviour, even if not
> necessarily the ideal. There are various things you can do:
>
> a) Delete ./a.cmi as part of your build procedure. This isn't ideal,
> though, because you lose the type-checking against d/a.cmi
> b) Have an empty ./a.mli but never compile it - the compiler will then
> unify ./a.cmo against d/a.cmi. This isn't ideal because having a
> source file which you don't expect to compile will confuse dependency
> generators and automatic build rules.
> c) Implement a new option in the compiler driver which suppresses the
> automatic generation of .cmi files (e.g. ocamlc -c -I d -no-cmi a.ml)

d) Make the compiler skip generation of .cmi if it sees one in the -I
   directories?

>
>
> David

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