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Diffstat (limited to 'docs/markdown/Subprojects.md')
| -rw-r--r-- | docs/markdown/Subprojects.md | 24 |
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diff --git a/docs/markdown/Subprojects.md b/docs/markdown/Subprojects.md index 0d1442e..ad2aae2 100644 --- a/docs/markdown/Subprojects.md +++ b/docs/markdown/Subprojects.md @@ -77,3 +77,27 @@ subproject `b` and have `b` also use `a`. Meson ships with a dependency system to automatically obtain dependency subprojects. It is documented in the [Wrap dependency system manual](Wrap-dependency-system-manual.md). + +# Why must all subprojects be inside a single directory? + +There are several reasons. + +First of all, to maintain any sort of sanity, the system must prevent going +inside other subprojects with `subdir()` or variations thereof. Having the +subprojects in well defined places makes this easy. If subprojects could be +anywhere at all, it would be a lot harder. + +Second of all it is extremely important that end users can easily see what +subprojects any project has. Because they are in one, and only one, place, +reviewing them becomes easy. + +This is also a question of convention. Since all Meson projects have the same +layout w.r.t subprojects, switching between projects becomes easier. You don't +have to spend time on a new project traipsing through the source tree looking +for subprojects. They are always in the same place. + +Finally if you can have subprojects anywhere, this increases the possibility of +having many different (possibly incompatible) versions of a dependency in your +source tree. Then changing some code (such as changing the order you traverse +directories) may cause a completely different version of the subproject to be +used by accident. |