It strikes me that whilst linux bods can jump right in with externals (ie. most linux people are used to building things before they are installed and also they have the compilers and things) the situation is very different for the average windows user.
That is the main compiler people use is not free (VC6)
- the free one (borland) is not compatible. Also windows
people are not used to this compile thing and its now where near as easy to set up on windows even if you do have the tools.
Got all that? ;-)
Therefore it might be nice to have a repository of compiled windows DLL's for people to access. It needn't be a big job
- a page on the Wikki would work if we all agreed to
maintain it properly.
Releated to this is the idea of cross platform "buddies" - one or more Windows external developers could partner with one or more Linux external developers and help produce versions of each others library for the other platform. This would mean that for people like myself who don't have useful acess to a linux dev box (well one with a GUI anyway - I've got telnet access to our CVS box) producing linux versions of my work would be easier. In return I would help port other objects to windows (increasing the number of externals I have access to).
Anyone have any thoughts on this?
mark