[ODE] documentation initiative

[Megan Fox]

I'm afraid I had some significant linking issues with your VC6 workspace
that didn't go away after running the bat files.  I had to use make to get a
library that would actually link up without error to my app.


... that aside, has anyone here used The Nebula Device 2
(http://nebuladevice.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/twiki/view/Nebula/WebHome)?
Both revisions of its buildsys (as well as the buildsys for Nebula 1)
operate through TCL, and generate all necessary workspaces for all platforms
when the TCL is run, using current sources and easy-to-update .bld spec
files for the various component packages that make up the library.

Something like this has the advantage of easy cross-platform maintenance,
since you only modify the one set of bld files, and it removes the need for
specific linux/windows/etc maintainers beyond someone to fix the bugs in the
build system as they crop up.  I'm sure it would be something of a bitch to
get working at first, but it's something you would (in theory) only need to
write once, and from then on only update the single set of cross-platform
build def files - as compared to ongoing work to keep VC6 workspaces/build
guides/make files/etc all up to date.

Just my 2 cents.

-Megan Fox

> Guys, "there should be a VC workspace in CVS"??  Well there is -
> mine!  Did
> you miss my recent posts about it??
>
> I understand the frustration getting ODE to work the first time - I did
> manage to get it to work on win using the configurator at the time, but it
> was messy and long winded (and things like 'you have to manually
> create the
> lib dir or it will fail mysteriously' don't help matters).
>
> That's why I pushed to have my workspace right in the ODE root, in \VC6.
> I'm not familiar with other platforms, but adding similar setups where
> appropriate for other compilers is the right thing to do IMO.
>
> I also think that pre-compiled binaries aren't really that helpful.  Why?
> Because official ODE releases tend to be seriously out of date,
> and so most
> people sooner or later want a CVS build - if they can't build it
> themselves,
> well, they're screwed.  The answer is simple, maintained compiler setups,
> not binaries (although they can be usefull to get started).
>
> With my workspace, all you do is:
>
> 1) setup the include/lib paths
> 2) run a batch file (to select float/double, trimish on/off support).
>
> (as documented in the ReadMe file).  That's it.
>
> BTW, Russ, please include it in the next official release - it's
> stable and
> will avoid a lot of the complaints.