[Julian Foad]
> So it sounds like if we were to make the build system effectively
> require (or even automatically perform) a "make uninstall" before
> "make", that would solve it.

That's effectively what we did in the Debian packaging a long long time
ago (2005, for 1.2.0).  My 1.6.x metadata says "Build-Conflicts:
libsvn-dev (<< 1.6)", which causes a build process to fail if you have
the old stuff installed (automated builds will just remove the old
stuff at this point, if necessary).

I agree with you that it isn't really an option in a less controlled
environment than Debian package building.  But yes, I'd support at
least a big fat warning if autoconf can manage to link to, say,
-lsvn_subr-1, before the build.

Notice, btw, that the ability to link to something is different from
the ability to run a program that is linked to it.  On a Linux ELF
platform, for example, there are two filenames that are important (both
are symlinks to a third file):

    libsvn_foo-1.so     used by the linker, _not_ used by applications later
    libsvn_foo-1.so.0   used by applications later, _not_ used by the linker

Therefore (still assuming Linux ELF), if you remove libsvn_foo-1.so
from its installed location, that should prevent this problem without
breaking installed apps.  Other platforms probably have similar
distinctions, though perhaps with other filenames.
-- 
Peter Samuelson | org-tld!p12n!peter | http://p12n.org/

Reply via email to