Everything I do, I do for you. I don't expect you to use it or thank me or pay me. All I'm saying is I could have more impact serving the community with fewer ifdefs.
And if you cut down every #ifdef in the code base, would you be able to stand in the winds that would blow then?
It's not just GNU make. Lots of GNU software is as you describe, because the GNU project took on the burden of abstracting the mess that was interoperating across many very different platforms -- many of which have far less capability than a modern or even decade-old x86-64 box -- and so became an internal reflection of that mess. It's not pleasant, I wish I could chuck autotools into the fucking sun, but it gets GNU going on a variety of exotic platforms that still run and are made more pleasant by the presence of GNU there. This effort is not helped by you going in and trying to yeet all the code you personally have decided is obsolete and gets in your way. GNU Make doesn't need such a "service", it's not "held back" by refusing it, and if you want a build tool that runs on and helps you build your little inner-platform effect without considering anything you personally deem irrelevant, write your own! Maybe start with Plan 9's mk as a base, it's tiny and comes from a somewhat similar philosophy.
Sheesh. Terry Davis believed he was important enough to be gangstalked by the CIA, and even he took a hobbyhorse, take-it-or-leave-it approach to TempleOS.
I don't have any authority over the GNU project. The things I do in the Cosmopolitan Libc repo have no bearing on them. They're free to keep doing what they're doing. However I'm willing to bet that once I add ptrace() support, it'll be attractive enough that folks will be willing to consider the equally libre copy of the GNU Make software that I intend to distribute instead. Just as they'll be free to copy what I did back into their own den of #ifdefs if they want to compete. Competition is good. Open source is good. It's all done with the best intentions. We're going to end up with a better Make once I've contributed this feature.
No worries friend. Not the first time I've gotten the Terry Davis treatment. Didn't Gandhi or someone say first they ignore, then laugh, then fight, and you win? Changing the world one line of code at a time!
