Dear Simon,
In message 1382800457-26608-1-git-send-email-sjg@chromium.org you wrote:
Many parts of the U-Boot code base are sprinkled with #ifdefs. This makes different boards compile different versions of the source code, meaning that we must build all boards to check for failures. It is easy to misspell an #ifdef and there is not as much checking of this by the compiler. Multiple dependent #ifdefs are harder to do than with if..then..else. Variable declarations must be #idefed as well as the code that uses them, often much later in the file/function. #ifdef indents don't match code indents and have their own separate indent feature. Overall, excessive use of #idef hurts readability and makes the code harder to modify and refactor. For people coming newly into the code base, #ifdefs can be a big barrier.
While I agree in general with the goal and the implementation, there is an implementation detail I dislike - this is that the new code is harder to type and to read - I mean, something like CONFIG_SYS_HUSH_PARSER is already clumsy enough, but making this autoconf_sys_hush_parser() appears to be worse. Also, the connection to a CONFIG_* option is not easily visible.
I also had feedback from Detlev (who is unfortunately on a business trip again so he didn't find time [yet] to comment himself); he commented that he really likes the idea, but does not like that we now have to access the well-known contants using a new name.
Maybe we can find a shorter / easier to read way to do this - I think it would be really nice if we could see the well-known names.
Best regards,
Wolfgang Denk