Dysfunctional Programming

In my work with new Mozilla contributors, I’ve seen a number of people get hung up on the whole .mozconfig voodoo madness. Yes, we made it possible to download the source and build it without having to even think about creating one, but as soon as you want to use a debug build, or build Fennec, the dream is over. Therefore, I’ve put together mozconfig.py which is designed to walk users through the process of creating a working .mozconfig file tailored to their needs.

The best way to use it at present is as follows:

$ ./mozconfig.py 2>~/mozilla-central/.mozconfig

This will send the generated file contents directly into the relevant .mozconfig, so all that’s left is running make. I’d love to be able to programmatically determine whether the program is actually invoked this way, so it could give helpful instructions otherwise. However, I’m open for ways in which to improve it (keep in mind the target audience of “people who need to work on common tasks that require changing .mozconfig options”), and I’m really keen on ideas of how best to market this (wiki pages, etc.) so that it reaches the widest possible audience.

Posted on October 3rd, 2011 by Josh Matthews
Filed under: mozilla