[daip] some AIPS weird/errorneus findings

[Marian Soida]

Hi,

I just like to share my yesterdays experience in compiling AIPS (31DEC19)
from sources with gcc/gfortran v8.3.0 at continuously updated Gentoo Linux.

After one of updates my AIPS stopped working - complaining about missing
libgfortran.so.3 library. This was understood as the most recent one is 
libgfortran.so.5. Since the binary installation of 31DEC19 uses the same(old)
library, I decided to compile it from sources. 

The first wall I faced, was lack of SUN rpc stuff in glibc-2.29. I was removed
some time ago as 'obsolete'. Fortunately Gentoo offers some work-around
with a 'ntirpc' package - but to use it one has to add -I/usr/include/tirpc
in the compiler command line (and -ltirc to linking options).
However, it was not so easy - two AIPS files:
./APL/DEV/UNIX/ZXDRST.C
./APL/DEV/UNIX/ZXDRFP.C
calling 'xdrmem_create' function. For some reason after compiling and 
storing into the library (by INSTEP2) require 'xdrmem_ncreate' function
- note the extra 'n' in the middle.
I compiled both files (PP, CCOM, and COMRPL) by hand - and I ended with
a correct library (requiring 'xdrmem_create'). What makes the difference
between calling the same command 'by hand' and within INTSTEP2 chain - stays 
a 'magic' to me(!)

Things went smooth up to the point in INTSTEP4 where it tries to compile 
./APL/PGM/NOTST/ATLOD.FOR
The compiler failed at line 12186:
         call getparm (jstat, grphdr, i_grphdr, 1, bufptr, buffer,
complaining about 'not enough members' in 'grphdr'. I noticed, that 
in fact the 'grphdr' (and 'i_grphdr') table is declared with size of '11',
and 'getparm' expects '640' (!). I changed the declaration to '640' (lines
11730, and 11729) and all went smooth on.

I just recalled one more thing - it seems to stay much longer than recent
versions, as I faced that many years ago (and got used to that...)
While compiling 'XAS' the Makefile forces the compiler to use '-c' option
when it is supposed to make 'xas' executable - and it fails of course. 
I always do that step manually.

I hope this can help in keeping AIPS alive...

Best regards,
-- 
							Marian Soida