1) README.md points to build hints (my fault if that's wrong..): https://gdal.org/development/building_from_source.html
but really there is crucial information (like that a C++ compiler is required!) at https://gdal.org/development/dev_environment.html which is misplaced, because people are who merely intending to compile gdal but not contribute to it, still need to know. I almost didn't even look at it before writing that it wasn't documented which C++ flavor is needed, because it was obviously not about what I needed to know. How do we want to fix this? move the prereqs into building_from_source (and probably flip that to before dev_environment) add a pointer in building_from_source that even for building as a user, see the prereqs listed in dev_environment something else? (Overall I find the organizational intent hard to follow. I would think "how to build from source" would be first, and then if people are getting help to set up an environment where they can run tests, make changes, etc. get into things that a user just building doesn't need to know.) I lean to the first option as easy and good enough to address the problem. 2) NEWS for 3.9 does not mention that there is now a requirement for a C++17 compiler. I'm not complaining about the new language requirement, given that 24 > 17 + enough, but that's a big deal, and it requires packagers to code for that because not every compiler supports C++17. gcc says https://gcc.gnu.org/projects/cxx-status.html#cxx17 you need gcc8. It turned out that gdal 3.9 didn't build on NetBSD 9, and someone coded the package for c++17 (which is easy). Increased build requirements are a big enough deal that they belong up front in NEWS. If not in "in a nutshell", there should probably be a "changes in requirements" section immediately after that. (My view is that building from source is the standard approach even if most don't, and that because people use packaged binaries, packagers are a particularly import audience, carrying the weight of all their users. There are enough older/LTS things out there that one can't assume the compiler supports newfangled stuff like c++17. We can just about now assume that c++11 support is present.) 3) The person also marked gdal for c17, but I can't find that in the "dev_environment" page - it says c99. It's also not in NEWS. This may be overzealous, and I'll ask. Mentioning it because I'm already writing. Thanks, Greg _______________________________________________ gdal-dev mailing list gdal-dev@lists.osgeo.org https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/gdal-dev
