devel/mk-files package

[Brook Milligan <brook%nmsu.edu@localhost>]

I hope this is not raising demons from the past, but I am curious about the abandonment of the devel/mk-files package (see PR 41021).

Originally, this package contained the *.mk files maintained by sjg@: see http://crufty.net/help/sjg/mk-files.htm.

There were conflicts with other versions of the *.mk files used by pkgsrc, now pkgtools/bootstrap-mk-files, and so the package was removed in 2010.

I am finding the new versions of the files useful in a cross-platform project in which I want to take advantage of the BSD *.mk files to follow the spirit of the NetBSD build system.  I am now wondering why this package no longer exists to install the files standalone for anyone who wishes to use them.

Here is some of my thinking:

- these makefiles are useful (only to me?), a sentiment that was expressed in PR 41021 as well

- they can be installed standalone in an appropriate directory, e.g., share/mk-sjg (bikeshed away), that does not conflict

- they can be used easily with (b)make -m dir

- they do not duplicate the bootstrap-mk-files, most of which have not been updated in 17 years and are not suitable as general *.mk files in the same way that either the NetBSD native ones or these are

- the NetBSD native *.mk files are not general in a cross-platform environment and so do not replace these files

- these files can allow a uniform set of BSD-like makefiles across platforms to maintain a consistent build system

I’m not sure what the downsides are.

Please advise on why it does not make sense to reimport the updated version of these files as devel/mk-files.  What am I missing?

Thanks a lot.

Cheers,
Brook