Elpa installation fails and general confusion

[salotz]

Hello all,

I've been struggling with getting ada-mode to install and work for me.

I am on Ubuntu 20.04 and Emacs 27.1 which I compile myself.

ELPA Installation Failure
-------------------------

The main issue is that the installation from ELPA does not work, even
after successfully compiling, as it seems it is an elisp issue.

On ELPA it says the current version is 7.1.4
(https://elpa.gnu.org/packages/ada-mode.html) and this is what I
install in emacs using package-list and installing ada-mode from elpa.
This also brings in wisi 3.1.3

There are a few dependencies when you compile that would helpful to
have documented somewhere. For completeness this is how I am installing
the compiler and gprbuild:

```
sudo apt install -y \
     gnat \
     gprbuild \

```

Which results in:

```
--> gnat --version
GNAT 9.3.0
Copyright (C) 1996-2019, Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This is free software; see the source for copying conditions.
There is NO warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A
PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

--> gprbuild --version
GPRBUILD Community 2019 (20190517) (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)
Copyright (C) 2004-2019, AdaCore
This is free software; see the source for copying conditions.
There is NO warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A
PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

For compiling ada-mode sources these packages were needed (maybe not
all of them):

```
sudo apt install -y \
     libgnatcoll18 \
     libgnatcoll18-dev \
     libgnatcoll-xref19 \
     libgnatcoll-xref19-dev \
     libgnatcoll-sqlite19 \
     libgnatcoll-sqlite18-dev \
     libgnatcoll-sqlite-bin
```

Perhaps the dependencies could be documented somewhere at least at a
high-level, and also for individual distros. I am new to ada dev as I
suspect most people are when installing the emacs mode.

Then to compile and install:

```
--> cd ~/.emacs.d/elpa/ada-mode-7.1.4/
--> ./build.sh 
ada_mode_wisi_parse.gpr:44:26: warning: object directory "obj" not found
wisi.gpr:32:26: warning: object directory "obj" not found
Setup
   [mkdir]        object directory for project Wisi
   [mkdir]        object directory for project Ada_Mode_Wisi_Parse
Compile
   [Ada]          ada_mode_wisi_lalr_parse.ads
   [Ada]          ada_mode_wisi_lr1_parse.ads
   [Ada]          run_ada_lalr_parse.ads
   [Ada]          run_ada_lr1_parse.ads
   [Ada]          gpr_mode_wisi_parse.ads
   [Ada]          run_gpr_parse.ads
   [Ada]          gpr_query.adb
   [C]            wisitoken_grammar_re2c.c
   [C]            ada_re2c.c
   [C]            gpr_re2c.c
   [Ada]          gen_run_wisi_lr_parse.adb
   [Ada]          gpr_process_actions.adb
   [Ada]          gpr_process_main.adb
   [Ada]          run_wisi_common_parse.adb
   [Ada]          wisi.adb
   [Ada]          wisi-gpr.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-parse.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-parse-lr.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-parse-lr-parser.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-syntax_trees.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-text_io_trace.adb
   [Ada]          emacs_wisi_common_parse.adb
   [Ada]          gen_emacs_wisi_lr_parse.adb
   [Ada]          ada_process_actions.adb
   [Ada]          ada_process_lalr_main.adb
   [Ada]          wisi-ada.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-parse-lr-mckenzie_recover.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-parse-lr-mckenzie_recover-ada.adb
   [Ada]          ada_process_lr1_main.adb
   [Ada]          gen_run_wisi_lr_text_rep_parse.adb
   [Ada]          gen_emacs_wisi_lr_text_rep_parse.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-lexer.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-semantic_checks.adb
   [Ada]          sal.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-parse-lr-parser_lists.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_unbounded_definite_vectors.adb
   [Ada]          sal-generic_decimal_image.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_definite_doubly_linked_lists.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_trimmed_image.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_unbounded_definite_queues.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_unbounded_definite_vectors-gen_image.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_unbounded_definite_vectors-gen_image_aux.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_unconstrained_array_image.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_array_image.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_bounded_definite_stacks-gen_image_aux.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_bounded_definite_vectors.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_bounded_definite_vectors-gen_image_aux.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_bounded_definite_vectors-gen_refs.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_unbounded_definite_min_heaps_fibonacci.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_unbounded_definite_vectors_sorted.adb
   [Ada]          long_float_elementary_functions.ads
   [Ada]          sal-gen_bounded_definite_stacks.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-parse-lr-mckenzie_recover-base.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-parse-lr-mckenzie_recover-explore.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-syntax_trees-lr_utils.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_unbounded_definite_red_black_trees.adb
   [Ada]          ada_re2c_c.ads
   [Ada]          wisitoken-lexer-re2c.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_unconstrained_array_image_aux.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_indefinite_doubly_linked_lists.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_unbounded_definite_stacks.adb
   [Ada]          sal-gen_bounded_definite_queues.adb
   [Ada]          wisitoken-parse-lr-mckenzie_recover-parse.adb
   [Ada]          gpr_re2c_c.ads
Bind
   [gprbind]      ada_mode_wisi_lalr_parse.bexch
   [gprbind]      ada_mode_wisi_lr1_parse.bexch
   [gprbind]      run_ada_lalr_parse.bexch
   [Ada]          ada_mode_wisi_lalr_parse.ali
   [Ada]          ada_mode_wisi_lr1_parse.ali
   [gprbind]      run_ada_lr1_parse.bexch
   [Ada]          run_ada_lalr_parse.ali
   [gprbind]      gpr_mode_wisi_parse.bexch
   [Ada]          run_ada_lr1_parse.ali
   [gprbind]      run_gpr_parse.bexch
   [Ada]          gpr_mode_wisi_parse.ali
   [gprbind]      gpr_query.bexch
   [Ada]          run_gpr_parse.ali
   [Ada]          gpr_query.ali
Link
   [archive]      libada_mode_wisi_parse.a
   [index]        libada_mode_wisi_parse.a
   [link]         ada_mode_wisi_lalr_parse.ads
   [link]         ada_mode_wisi_lr1_parse.ads
   [link]         run_ada_lalr_parse.ads
   [link]         run_ada_lr1_parse.ads
   [link]         gpr_mode_wisi_parse.ads
   [link]         run_gpr_parse.ads
   [link]         gpr_query.adb

--> sudo ./install.sh 
Install project Ada_Mode_Wisi_Parse

```

Looks good.

However, when in emacs when I try to activate ada-mode I get this error:

```
Symbol’s function definition is void: wisi--lexer-error
```

I'm willing to try other things, but I'm a little confused as where to
even start.

General confusion issues in no particular order:
------------------------------------------------

I also was confused about ada-mode coming with the emacs
distribution (which was already addressed on the mailing list). It would
be nice to get that cleared up.

However, looking at the upstream home page for ada-mode
(http://www.nongnu.org/ada-mode/) it advertises that 7.1.3 is the
newest version.

The NEWS page there however is listing the 30 Jan 2020 release as 7.0.1
(http://www.nongnu.org/ada-mode/NEWS-ada-mode.text). Would be nice if
this was up to date.

The tarball downloads page in savannah doesn't have any labelled
7.1.3. It looks like the latest there is 7.0.1 like the NEWS page.

----------

Hopefully someone can help me out.

Regards,
~Sam

PS I'm new to mailing lists, hopefully I did this right.