Re: [PATCH 1/3] WAN Kconfig: change "depends on HDLC" to "select"

On 5/8/07, Randy Dunlap [off-list ref] wrote:

On Mon, 07 May 2007 16:31:48 -0400 Jeff Garzik wrote:

quoted

Satyam Sharma wrote:

quoted

Yes, mixing select and depends is a recipe for build disasters. Call
me a rabid fanatic, but I would in fact go as far as to say that this
whole "select" thing in the Kconfig process is one big BUG, and not a
feature. People are lazy by nature and would rather just "select" a
dependency for their config option than burden users with several
"depends".

Tough, the kernel community has voted against you.

Andrew (usually) implores people not to use "select" and I agree
with him.

quoted

It makes far more sense to include a driver during kernel configuration,
and have that driver pull in its libraries via 'select'.  The lame
alternative requires developers to know which libraries they need BEFORE
picking their drivers, which is backwards and requires legwork on the
part of the kernel developer.

Developers?  If you had said "users," I might agree, but IMO it's
OK (or even Good) for developers to know what libraries their code
uses/requires.  Yes, that's a good thing.

You're absolutely right, but to give Jeff the benefit of the doubt I'm
sure he _meant_ "users" there although he said "developers". Stating
the obvious, the developer _has_ to know what stuff his code uses
anyway, otherwise what does he "select"s or "depends" his config
option on.

As for users, we _can_ avoid pitfalls by building a complete
dependency tree and just selecting _everything_ that we require for a
particular config option to be selected, but some users could
conceivably prefer only being _told_ about what else they need to
successfully pick a config option (than everything just getting in
behind their backs). Actually (correct me if I'm wrong), this is not
presently possible: an option is not visible unless dependencies are
already picked. Just a suggestion, though.