Restructure release notes. Add one about use of += on lists returned from Builders...

[scons.git] / src / RELEASE.txt

# __COPYRIGHT__
# __FILE__ __REVISION__ __DATE__ __DEVELOPER__


                 SCons - a software construction tool

                            Release Notes


This is a beta release of SCons, a tool for building software (and other
files).  SCons is implemented in Python, and its "configuration files"
are actually Python scripts, allowing you to use the full power of a
real scripting language to solve build problems.  You do not, however,
need to know Python to use SCons effectively.

So that everyone using SCons can help each other learn how to use it
more effectively, please sign up for the scons-users mailing list at:

    http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/scons-users



RELEASE 0.97 - XXX

  This is a pre-release for testing the eighth beta release of SCons.
  Please consult the CHANGES.txt file for a list of specific changes
  since last release.

  Please note the following important changes since release 0.96:

    --  DIRECTORY TREES ARE NO LONGER AUTOMATICALLY SCANNED FOR CHANGES

        Custom builders and Command() calls that accept directories as
        source arguments no longer scan entire on-disk directory trees
        by default.  This means that their targets will not be
        automatically rebuilt if a file changes on disk, and SCons does
        *not* already know about.  Note that the targets will still be
        rebuilt correctly if a file changes that SCons already knows
        about due to a Builder or other call.

        The existing behavior of scanning on-disk directory trees for
        any changed file can be maintained by passing the new DirScanner
        global directory scanner as the source_scanner keyword argument
        to the Builder call:

            bld = Builder("build < $SOURCE > $TARGET",
                          source_scanner = DirScanner)

        The same keyword argument can also be supplied to any Command()
        calls that need to scan directory trees on-disk for changed files:

            env.Command("archive.out", "directory",
                        "archiver -o $TARGET $SOURCE",
                        source_scanner = DirScanner)

        This change was made because scanning directories by default
        could cause huge slowdowns if a configurable directory like /usr
        or /usr/local was passed as the source to a Builder or Command()
        call, in which case SCons would scan the entire directory tree.

    --  CACHED Configure() RESULTS ARE STORED IN A DIFFERENT FILE

        The Configure() subsystem now stores its cached results in a
        different file.  This may cause configuration tests to be re-run
        the first time after you install 0.97.

    --  setup.py NOW INSTALLS MAN PAGES ON UNIX AND Linux SYSTEMS

        The SCons setup.py script now installs the "scons.1" and
        "sconsign.1" man pages on UNIX and Linux systems.  A
        new --no-install-man

    --  ParseConfig() METHOD ADDS LIBRARY FILE NAMES TO THE $LIBS VARIABLE

        The ParseConfig() method now adds library file names returned
        by the specified *-config command to the $LIBS construction
        variable, instead of returning them (the same way it handles
        the -l option).

    --  ParseConfig() METHOD DOESN'T ADD DUPLICATES TO CONSTRUCTION VARIABLES

        By default, the ParseConfig() method now avoids adding duplicate
        entries to construction variables.  The old behavior may be
        specified using a new "unique=0" keyword argument.

    --  WINDOWS %TEMP% and %TMP% VARIABLES ARE PROPAGATED AUTOMATICALLY

        The %TEMP% and %TMP% external environment variables are now
        propagated automatically to the command execution environment on
        Windows systems.

    --  VISUAL STUDIO ATL AND MFC DIRECTORIES NOT ADDED BY DEFAULT

        When compiling with Microsoft Visual Studio, SCons no longer
        adds the ATL and MFC directories to the INCLUDE and LIB
        environment variables by default.  If you want these directories
        included in your environment variables, you should now set the
        $MSVS_USE_MFC_DIRS *construction* variable when initializing
        your environment:

            env = Environment(MSVS_USE_MFC_DIRS = 1)

    --  BUILDERS RETURN A LIST-LIKE OBJECT, NOT A REGULAR LIST

        Builders calls now return an object that behaves like a list
        (and which provides some other functionality), not an underlying
        Python list.  In general, this should not cause any problems,
        although it introduces a subtle change in the following behavior:

                obj += env.Object('foo.c')

        If "obj" is a list, Python will no longer update the "obj" in
        place, because the return value from env.Object() is no longer
        the same type.  Python will instead allocate a new object and
        assign the local variable "obj" to it.  If "obj" is defined in
        an SConscript file that calls another SConscript file containing
        the above code, "obj" in the first SConscript file will not
        contain the objects.

        You can guarantee that a list will be updated in place regardless
        of which SConscript file defines it and which adds to it by
        using the list append() method as follows:

                obj.append(env.Object('foo.c'))

    --  OUTPUT OF Configure() SUBSYSTEM CHANGED SLIGHTLY

        The Configure() subsystem now reports tests results as "yes" and
        "no" instead of "ok" and "failed."  This might interfere with any
        scripts that automatically parse the Configure() output from SCons.

    --  DEPRECATED GLOBAL FUNCTIONS HAVE BEEN REMOVED

        The following deprecated global functions have been removed:
        ParseConfig(), SetBuildSignatureType(), SetContentSignatureType(),
        SetJobs() and GetJobs().

    --  DEPRECATED "validater" KEYWORD HAS BEEN REMOVED

        The deprecated "validater" keyword to the Options.Add() method
        has been removed.

  Please note the following important changes since release 0.95:

    --  BUILDERS NOW ALWAYS RETURN A LIST OF TARGETS

        All Builder calls (both built-in like Program(), Library(),
        etc. and customer Builders) now always return a list of target
        Nodes.   If the Builder only builds one target, the Builder
        call will now return a list containing that target Node, not
        the target Node itself as it used to do.

        This change should be invisibile to most normal uses of the
        return values from Builder calls.  It will cause an error if the
        SConscript file was performing some direct manipulation of the
        returned Node value.  For example, an attempt to print the name
        of a target returned by the Object() Builder:

              target = Object('foo.c')
              # OLD WAY
              print target

        Will now need to access the first element in the list returned by
        the Object() call:

              target = Object('foo.c')
              # NEW AY
              print target[0]

        This change was introduced to make the data type returned by Builder
        calls consistent (always a list), regardless of platform or number
        of returned targets.

    --  DEFAULT SConsignFile() DATABASE SCHEME HAS CHANGED

        The SConsignFile() function now uses an internally-supplied
        SCons.dblite module as the default DB scheme for the .sconsign file.
        If you are using the SConsignFile() function without an explicitly
        specified dbm_module argument, this will cause all of your targets
        to be recompiled the first time you use SCons 0.96.  To preserve the
        previous behavior, specify the "anydbm" module explicitly:

            import anydbm
            SConsignFile('.sconsign_file_name', anydbm)

    --  INTERNAL .sconsign FILE FORMAT HAS CHANGED

        The internal format of .sconsign files has been changed.  This might
        cause warnings about "ignoring corrupt .sconsign files" and rebuilds
        when you use SCons 0.96 for the first time in a tree that was
        previously built with SCons 0.95 or earlier.

    --  INTERFACE CHANGE OF scan_check FUNCTION TO CUSTOM SCANNERS

        The scan_check function that can be supplied to a custom Scanner now
        must take two arguments, the Node to be checked and a construction
        environment.  It previously only used the Node as an argument.

    --  DEFAULT SCANNERS NO LONGER HEED INTERNAL Scanner.add_skey() METHOD

        The internal Scanner.add_skey() method no longer works for the
        default scanners, which now use construction variables to hold their
        lists of suffixes.  If you had a custom Tool specification that was
        reaching into the internals in this way to add a suffix to one of
        the following scanner, you must now add the suffix to a construction
        environment through which you plan to call the scanner, as follows:

            CScan.add_skey('.x')       => env.Append(CPPSUFFIXES = ['.x'])
            DScan.add_skey('.x')       => env.Append(DSUFFIXES = ['.x'])
            FortranScan.add_skey('.x') => env.Append(FORTRANSUFFIXES = ['.x'])

    --  KEYWORD ARGUMENTS TO Builder() HAVE BEEN REMOVED

        The "node_factory" and "scanner" keyword arguments to the Builder()
        function have been removed.  In their place, the separate and more
        flexible "target_factory," "source_factory," "target_scanner" and
        "source scanner" keywords should be used instead.

    --  ALL-DIGIT FILE "EXTENSIONS" ARE NOW PART OF THE FILE BASENAME

        SCons now treats file "extensions" that contain all digits (for
        example, "file.123") as part of the file basename, for easier
        handling of version numbers in the names of shared libraries
        and other files.  Builders will now add their file extensions to
        file names specified with all-digit extensions.  If you need to
        generate a file with an all-digit extension using a Builder that
        adds a file extension, you can preserve the previous behavior by
        wrapping the file name in a File() call.

    --  Append()/Prepend() METHODS CHANGED WHEN USING UserList OBJECTS

        The behavior of the env.Append() and env.Prepend() methods has
        changed when appending a string value to a UserList, or vice versa.
        They now behave like normal Python addition of a string to
        a UserList.  Given an initialization and an env.Append() call like:

            env = Environment(VAR1=UserList(['foo']), VAR2='foo')
            env.Append(VAR1='bar', VAR2=UserList(['bar'])

        The resulting values of $VAR1 and $VAR2 will now be ['foo', 'b',
        'a', 'r'] and ['f', 'o', 'o', 'bar'], respectively.  This is because
        Python UserList objects treat strings as sequences of letters when
        adding them to the value of the UserList.

        The old behavior of yielding $VAR1 and $VAR2 values of ['foo',
        'bar'] when either variable is a UserList object now requires that
        the string variables be enclosed in a list:

            env = Environment(VAR1=UserList(['foo']), VAR2=['foo'])
            env.Append(VAR1='bar', VAR2=UserList(['bar']))

        Note that the SCons behavior when appending to normal lists has
        *not* changed, and the behavior of all of the default values that
        SCons uses to initialize all construction variables has *not*
        changed.  This change *only* affects any cases where you explicitly
        use UserList objects to initialize or append to a variable.

  Please note the following planned, future changes:

    --  SCANNER NAMES HAVE BEEN DEPRECATED AND WILL BE REMOVED

        Several internal variable names in SCons.Defaults for various
        pre-made default Scanner objects have been deprecated and will
        be removed in a future revision.  In their place are several new
        global variable names that are now part of the publicly-supported
        interface:

            NEW NAME              DEPRECATED NAME
            --------              ----------------------------
            CScanner              SCons.Defaults.CScan
            DSCanner              SCons.Defaults.DScan
            SourceFileScanner     SCons.Defaults.ObjSourceScan
            ProgramScanner        SCons.Defaults.ProgScan

        Of these, only ObjSourceScan was probably used at all, to add
        new mappings of file suffixes to other scanners for use by the
        Object() Builder.  This should now be done as follows:

            SourceFileScanner.add_scanner('.x', XScanner)

  SCons is developed with an extensive regression test suite, and a
  rigorous development methodology for continually improving that suite.
  Because of this, SCons is of sufficient quality that you can use it
  for real work.  The "beta" status of the release reflects that we
  still may change interfaces in future releases, which may require
  modifications to your SConscript files.  We strive to hold these
  changes to a minimum.

  Nevertheless, please heed the following disclaimers:

    - Please report any bugs or other problems that you find to our bug
      tracker at our SourceForge project page:

      http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=add&group_id=30337&atid=398971

      We have a reliable bug-fixing methodology already in place and
      strive to respond to problems relatively quickly.

    - Documentation is spottier than we'd like.  You may need to dive
      into the source code to figure out how to do something.  Asking
      questions on the scons-users mailing list is also welcome.  We
      will be addressing the documentation in upcoming releases, but
      would be more than glad to have your assistance in correcting this
      problem... :-)

      In particular, the "SCons Design" documentation on the SCons web
      site is currently out of date, as we made significant changes to
      portions of the interface as we figured out what worked and what
      didn't during implementation.

    - There may be performance issues.  Improving SCons performance
      is an ongoing priority.  If you still find the performance
      unacceptable, we would very much like to hear from you and learn
      more about your configuration so we can optimize the right things.

    - Error messages don't always exist where they'd be helpful.
      Please let us know about any errors you ran into that would
      have benefitted from a (more) descriptive message.

  KNOWN PROBLEMS IN THIS RELEASE:

    For a complete list of known problems, consult the SCons bug tracker
    page at SourceForge:

        http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?atid=398971&group_id=30337&func=browse

    - Support for parallel builds (-j) does not work on WIN32 systems
      prior to *official* Python release 2.2 (not 2.2 pre-releases).

      Prior to Python 2.2, there is a bug in Python's Win32
      implementation such that when a thread spawns an external command,
      it blocks all threads from running.  This breaks the SCons
      multithreading architecture used to support -j builds.

      We have included a patch file, os_spawnv_fix.diff, that you can
      use if you you want to fix your version of Python to support
      parallel builds in SCons.

    - Again, the "SCons Design" documentation on the SCons web
      site is currently out of date.  Take what you read there with a
      grain of salt.

    - On Win32 systems, you must put a space between the redirection
      characters < and >, and the specified files (or construction
      variable expansions):

        command < $SOURCE > $TARGET

      If you don't supply a space (for example, "<$SOURCE"), SCons will
      not recognize the redirection.

    - MSVC .res files are not rebuilt when icons change.

    - The -c option does not clean up .sconsign files or directories
      created as part of the build, and also does not clean up
      SideEffect files (for example, Visual Studio .pdb files).

    - Switching content signatures from "MD5" to "timestamp" and back
      again can cause unusual errors.  These errors can be cleared up by
      removing all .sconsign files.

    - When using multiple Repositories, changing the name of an include
      file can cause an old version of the file to be used.

    - There is currently no way to force use of a relative path (../*)
      for directories outside the top-level SConstruct file.

    - The Jar() Builder will, on its second or subsequent invocation,
      package up the .sconsign files that SCons uses to track signatures.
      You can work around this by using the SConsignFile() function
      to collect all of the .sconsign information into a single file
      outside of the directory being packaged by Jar().

    - SCons does not currently have a way to detect that an intermediate
      file has been corrupted from outside and should be rebuilt.

    - Unicode characters in path names do not work in all circumstances.

    - A stray source file in a BuildDir can prevent targets from being
      (re)built when they should.

    - SCons does not automatically rebuild LaTeX files when the file
      has an undefined reference on the first build.

    - Use of --implicit-cache with TargetSignatures('content') can,
      for some changes, not rebuild a file when necessary.

    - SCons does not currently automatically check out SConstruct or
      SConscript files from SCCS, RCS or BitKeeper.

    - No support yet for the following planned command-line options:

         -d -e -l --list-actions --list-derived --list-where
         -o --override -p -r -R -w --write-filenames
         -W --warn-undefined-variables



Thank you for your interest, and please let us know how we can help
improve SCons for your needs.

Steven Knight
knight at baldmt dot com
http://www.baldmt.com/~knight/

With plenty of help from the SCons Development team:
        Chad Austin
        Charles Crain
        Steve Leblanc
        Gary Oberbrunner
        Anthony Roach
        Greg Spencer
        Christoph Wiedemann