[asdf-devel] load order of dependencies

[Attila Lendvai]

dear list,

my use-case: i want to make sure that when a system is loaded
(compiled) due to its test suite being invoked, then a full-blown
optional dependency be loaded first, and only then the system itself
(which checks for #+(cl:find-package :foo) at compile time).

to be more specific, it's about whether to load or not a full logging
library with heavy dependencies. when the test suite is invoked, then
debugging will most probably follow, so load logging first that
affects the compilation of the system itself.

and to be even more specific, we have a custom develop-op, that does
all kind of things, including the seeking and loading of all the
optional swank integration systems we have, etc. (note: i was doing
the experiments below using plain 'asdf:load-system invoked on
:hu.dwim.reiterate+hu.dwim.logger, and AFAICS there are no
customizations that should interfere, but hit me on the head with the
ASDF manual if you believe otherwise, and i should go back and try to
synthesize a stripped down test case.)

this is how i wanted to achieve it:

CL-USER> (asdf:asdf-version)
"2.017"


try #1 (in any order, reiterate is compiled before the logger):

:in-order-to ((load-op (load-op :hu.dwim.logger :hu.dwim.reiterate))
                (compile-op (compile-op :hu.dwim.logger :hu.dwim.reiterate)))

without any :depends-on entry, which as far as i understand compiles
into :in-order-to entries.


try #2 (the before methods seem to get invoked too late when logger
has fasls and reiterate doesn't?! but seems to work when neither have
fasls?!):

(defsystem :hu.dwim.reiterate+hu.dwim.logger
  :class hu.dwim.system
  :description "Loads hu.dwim.logger first, so that proper logging is
available when developing, but not making the extra dependency
mandatory."
  :depends-on (:hu.dwim.reiterate
               :hu.dwim.logger))

(defmethod perform :before ((op operation) (system (eql (find-system
:hu.dwim.reiterate+hu.dwim.logger))))
  (load-system :hu.dwim.logger))

(defmethod perform :before ((op operation) (system (eql (find-system
:hu.dwim.reiterate))))
  (load-system :hu.dwim.logger))

(defmethod perform :before ((op operation) (system (eql (find-system
:hu.dwim.reiterate.test))))
  (load-system :hu.dwim.logger))


but to the point: what's the contract regarding the load/compile order
of dependencies? and if there's any, then how can i tell ASDF to load
hu.dwim.logger first? (i couldn't find anything in the manual, but i
welcome a "try again in chapter 6", because asdf sources are not too
easy on my parser...)

and if the order is not specified in the ASDF contract, then can we
apply a randomizer to the otherwise equal dependencies? i've seen it
many times before that unrecorded dependencies showed up as filesystem
order changed (or something else, it's just an assumption, but the
missing dependency often materialized when deploying the system on a
different machine).

-- 
 attila

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