[Issue 16746] Please output Makefile-style depfiles for ninja and make

[via Digitalmars-d-bugs]

https://issues.dlang.org/show_bug.cgi?id=16746

--- Comment #13 from Vladimir Panteleev <thecybershadow at gmail.com> ---
(In reply to Matthias Klumpp from comment #12)
> Sounds really good, but AFAIK this is still in the far future...
> GDC supports writing depfiles properly, and having this feature in DMD would
> enable it for DMD and LDC at the same time, making depfiles work for all D
> compilers.

That's true.

> Usually in distributions we package just the minimal amount of things
> necessary to compile a certain leaf package (e.g. all the stuff one needs to
> compile Vibe.d/Tilix/...) and more is added when another package requires
> the feature.

That makes sense if you treat D purely as a dependency, but I think it's worth
looking at it as a software application package as well. rdmd is mentioned in
TDPL, so it is essentially part of D. This is why I'm uneasy about the idea of
splitting up the tools that dlang.org ships together.

> At the moment, nothing uses rdmd, and adding it would mean someone would
> need to maintain the package over the lifetime of the distro release.

Why a separate package? Why not ship it with dmd? Is it just because it's
useful not just for dmd, but also ldc/gdc? If so, why not have a dtools package
like Arch Linux, which includes rdmd, dustmite, ddemangle, etc.?

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