Joerg:

How do you define "does not work"?  If you mean "the build fails",
then yes, that does hold true for a lot of the larger packages.
However, in some circumstances there are trivial fixes or it does
work.  I find it most convenient for modular Xorg, where all the
builds work.  Of course, there could be other issues aside from
outright build failures that I haven't noticed.  Are you aware of any?

Example of some MAKE_JOBS fixes:

  * devel/ncurses is MAKE_JOBS_SAFE if built with gmake (there are
other examples of this)
  * x11/libX11 and modular-xorg-server *seem* to be MAKE_JOBS_SAFE,
i.e. the builds complete
  * graphics/MesaLib is MAKE_JOBS_SAFE as of 6.5.3 if certain nits
with their build system are fixed and it is built with gmake (gmake is
essential for MAKE_JOBS > 1 in many cases).

I find MAKE_JOBS_SAFE useful and think it should remain.  However, I'd
rather see pkgsrc get smarter vis a vis locking, etc. when building
multiple packages at once than effort be put into
improving/maintaining MAKE_JOBS_SAFE.  I also don't mind if the
default is changed, but please don't get rid of it altogether.  In
addition, I think it could be helpful if pkgsrc supported
${MAKE_JOBS_SAFE.${PKGBASE}} or some other means of enabling/disabling
it on a per-pkg basis other than adding MAKE_JOBS_SAFE to makefiles so
that one doesn't have to maintain those changes in the local tree.

Regards,


--Blair