Re: libtool fails with uninstalled frameworks and the -F flag

Hi Michael,

[moved to libtool-patches list]

On Jan 14, 2014, at 11:45 AM, Michael C. Grant <[email protected]> wrote:

> I'm trying to compile GNU Octave and its new Qt GUI on a Mac OSX with Homebrew. Homebrew installs the Qt frameworks in /usr/local/Cellar/qt/4.8.5/lib, so after some fiddling with the configure script I get this:
> 
> QT_LDFLAGS=-F/usr/local/Cellar/qt/4.8.5/lib
> QT_LIBS=-framework QtCore -framework QtGui -framework QtNetwork
> 
> However, the libtool script does not handle the -F argument through properly, so it is stripped out of the linking process.
> 
> I created the following patch for the generated libtool script, which causes libtool to treat -F exactly like it treats -L. This seems to do the trick.
> 
> I did notice that scanning through past discussions that this has come up a couple of times, but there is reluctance to provide full support for -F for some reason. Perhaps the relative simplicity of this patch would convince you to reconsider. I'm also discussing this with the Homebrew folks to see if they would consider including in their formula, but they do prefer not to use patches if they can help it.

Thanks for the patch.  Sorry I didn't reply to your earlier emails - I marked them for further attention, but didn't make the time to actually go back and respond.

My main worry is whether that changing libtool's treatment of -F is going to do something unexpected on another platform.  That said, apart from your conflating of -L and -F in the case branches with the patch you sent, I'm open to including it in the upcoming release if you don't mind reworking it a little?

Please keep the -L and -F branches separate, factoring the branch bodies into a shell function if necessary to prevent cut-n-pasting blocks of code between the two.  Bonus points if you could also make -F behave as before on all platforms but *-darwin*.

If you have github, I keep a mirror of libtool at http://github.com/gvvaughan/GNU-libtool, so that might be a more convenient way for you to submit a pull request than dropping patch attachments into the mailing list.

I have a couple of small fixes of my own that I need to polish and push, and then I'll do another round of platform testing to nail down what else is a show-stopper for a final pre-release.

Cheers,
-- 
Gary V. Vaughan (gary AT gnu DOT org)

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