I've added you to the list of users with svn write permissions. If your proposed change works on your platform, please check it in. In this case it will probably work everywhere. It is easy to temporarily back out the changes again if necessary. (Please see libtbx/development/dev_guidelines.txt if you get a chance.) OK, I will change my patch and upload it then.
Great. If you like check it in under libtbx. That would enable others to help out; I don't have much spare time but I'll definitely look and maybe there are a few quick things I can help with.
I need to test that first and then I can share it.
Do we need the dependency analysis for this? I'd expect that the install operation finishes in a few seconds. It is probably easier to write a plain Python script not involving SCons. I guess it's probably easier to make an install target in scons. Because scons always knows what was built.
That's true, but it will make things more complicated. The C++ sources can be very useful as a reference even for pure Python users. For the first pass I suggest copying the complete source tree. Getting all include files will need extra attention. Some are generated when you run libtbx/configure.py, under <build>/include. That reminds me of something. There were some other problems too. The SConscripts are trying to build libantlr3, libcbf and libclipper and then link against them. But this libraries already exist in most distributions. I solved it commenting (patch) out the builder for Debian, but this is no solution for upstream. I don't know how this could be solved. Maybe the "get_library_builder(env)" could check for libraries first and only build if they're missing? Also you are building libann that is manipulated with the self_include part. This conflicts with the libann a distribution is offering. I solved it for my Debian package by building and linking it statically to the extensions. Would it be possible to rename the lib to i.e. libann-adaptbx? Also I had to rename libclipper to libclipper-core, libantlr3 to libantlr3c.
I realize this is a lot of changes I'm requesting and they are only suggestions, I don't wanna push anything. It's not a big deal for me to patch this only for my package all the time, so I wouldn't mind if you don't like my ideas.