[webkit-dev] IDL and JavaScript bindings .. ?

[Darin Adler]

On Aug 7, 2008, at 8:49 AM, Javed Rabbani wrote:

> Why is there any need to generate JavaScript bindings via IDL files  
> using Perl scripts. What I want to say is why these binding files  
> are not part of the source?

There are at least two different answers to your question:

     1) Using IDL files instead of hand written bindings allows us to  
easily change details of the binding mechanism without modifying  
hundreds of files. It's been a great boon for folks working on the  
WebKit project.

     2) The WebKit source repository doesn't include copies of  
generated files. That includes the files generated by the IDL scripts,  
bison-based parsers, flex-based lexers, and many other generated  
source files. This is the usual practice in most software projects.  
Checking in copies of those generated files would help some people,  
but can cause all sorts of problems.

     -- Darin