[gmx-developers] Future developments

[Erik Lindahl]

Hi,

On Feb 24, 2009, at 1:35 PM, David van der Spoel wrote:

> Hi,
>
> yesterday I put a question on the developer list on where to put a  
> new mini-library for statistics. Right now it is used only from the  
> analysis tools but it might also be used from other parts of the  
> code. Hence I suggested placement in gmxlib, or even directly in  
> src. If no one object I will do this later today.
>
> More in general, we should decide on the future structure of the  
> source tree, do we want a src directory with dozens of  
> subdirectories, or should it be hierarchical. Do we move to one  
> library or do we keep four different ones?
Long-term I'd say we want one library, but with proper namespaces :-)


> We should also document code recommendations. For instance, Berk  
> stated in another mail recently that we moved to the 4 space  
> indentation etc. We should put this information on the wiki, for  
> everyone (including me) to read.
>
>
> Finally, if we are going to allow C++ code, then we should link  
> everything with a C++ compiler, and the configure.ac should be  
> adapted. We probably need to adapt header files as well (at least if  
> they are used from C++).

I think our decision was to stick to C only for 4.1 (since we can get  
that out during spring), but once that is branched of we will aim for  
5.0 where we do a bunch of things like

* Allow C++
* Demand 64-bit integer support
* Demand libxml2 to be present
* Change code layouts for clarity

etc.

Cheers,

Erik