Cons is a software construction system. A description appears under
"Cons 1.0", below.

$Id: //depot/proj/cons/src/CHANGES#4 $

Cons 1.5
********
- Added Repository global function, similar to make's VPATH, and
  supporting functions:  Local, Install_Local, Repository_List,
  Repository_Sig_Times_OK.

- Added -R command-line option as a synonym for Repository.

- Bugfix for SplitPath (when given a path with N components, 
  it returned N**2 components).

Cons 1.4a3
**********
- Construction local help can now be provided by defining at the top of 
  toplevel script, the following:
  Help qq( all the help material);
  
Cons 1.4a2
**********
- LIBPATH, CPPPATH, and program search path ENV->{PATH} may all now
  be arrays. The old usage (colon separated strings) is deprecated, but
  still supported. In the old form, on Unix, ":"'s separate path components,
  and on Windows, ";" separates them.

- PATH_SEPERATOR was finally changed to PATH_SEPARATOR

- Default target support has been added (see RELEASE for details).

Cons 1.4 (alpha1)
*****************

This release of Cons has a number of changes. Briefly, they are:

 - a QuickScan function that makes it trivial to set up 
   simple dependency scanners

 - improvements in signature calculation for better control of rebuilds

 - a caching mechanism for sharing derived files between builds

 - new global functions: UseCache, Salt, SourcePath, ConsPath.

 - some minor cleanup

Cons 1.3.1
**********

This is a minor release with limited shared library support. Documentation
is now maintained in pod format, thanks to the cons.pod file from
Ulrich Pfiefer.

Cons 1.3
********

This is the first combined Win32 and unix cons. This contains some
significant fixes that enables the same cons file to be used for both
platforms.

Cons 1.2
********

This is the WIN32 port of cons.

Cons 1.1
********

This is a minor patch release to cons 1.0. This contains a number of
minor changes, a bug fix affecting multi-target commands, and a couple
of minor new features. A list of changes from 1.0 to 1.1 is included
in the file CHANGES. There are no incompatible changes between 1.0 and
1.1. The NT support is working well here, but it still hasn't been
integrated into an single version of cons. The changes are quite
simple, and if anyone wants it let me know.

Cons 1.0
********

This is a Perl5-based make replacement, but does not provide make
compatibility.

You will need Perl 5.002 or better and the Perl MD5 Extension
(MD5-1.6.tar.gz), available from CPAN.

This program is known to work on a variety of platforms: it's in
production use on versions of SunOS, Solaris, HPUX, AIX, and IRIX.

The current program will not work correctly on Windows/NT, but we do
have an internal version that does appear to work on that platform,
but has not been well tested. If anyone is interested, contact me.
	
PostScript documentation is in cons.ps.

The following is an excerpt from the introduction in cons.ps:

 Cons is a system for constructing, primarily, software, but is quite
 different from previous software construction systems. Cons was
 designed from the ground up to deal easily with the construction of
 software spread over multiple source directories. Cons makes it easy
 to create build scripts that are simple, understandable and
 maintainable. Cons ensures that complex software is easily and
 accurately reproducible.

 Cons uses a number of techniques to accomplish all of this.
 Construction scripts are just Perl scripts, making them both easy to
 comprehend and very flexible. Global scoping of variables is replaced
 with an import/export mechanism for sharing information between
 scripts, significantly improving the readability and maintainability
 of each script. Construction environments are introduced: these are
 Perl objects that capture the information required for controlling the
 build process. Multiple environments are used when different semantics
 are required for generating products in the build tree. Cons
 implements automatic dependency analysis and uses this to globally
 sequence the entire build. Variant builds are easily produced from a
 single source tree. Intelligent build subsetting is possible, when
 working on localized changes. Overrides can be setup to easily
 override build instructions without modifying any scripts. MD5
 cryptographic signatures are associated with derived files, and are
 used to accurately determine whether a given file needs to be rebuilt.

Complaints, suggestions, kudos, etc. to:

	Bob Sidebotham
	rns@fore.com
	1-412-635-3366

	FORE Systems
	Pittsburgh, PA.