Some more msvc++ 8.2.4 build feedback

In addition to the encoding issues I have with the 8.2.4 MSVC++ build
(see previous email), there are some other issues that I've run into:

1. The custom build step that generates DEF files for DLLS using a perl
script does not work. The perl script runs, and a slew of symbol
information is output to the MSVC++ console. And a def file is created,
but it always empty.

If you run the perl script (gendef.pl) by hand from a DOS prompt, the
DEF file is created correctly. That of course is a bit of pain since
you have to do it for a number of the MSVC++ projects.

2. The build has hard-coded paths (as far as I can see) to zlib and
openssl. Is there a way to a) remove them or b) change them ahead of
time so you don't have to manually change 20+ project files?

3. If you have a contrib module that is not known to the build system
it blows up. For example, I use PostGIS. When running build.bat it
stops at postgis (sorry, I didn't write down the error message but can
easily get it if needed). Could unknown contrib modules just be skipped
instead?

4. I was surprised to find out that a MSVC++ build cannot open a
database cluster created by a MSYS build (not sure about vice versa
since I didn't checked). When running pg_ctl start a checksum error is
returned. Is this expected? I got around it by doing a dump from the
MSYS database and a restore into the MSVC++ database, which worked fine.

Hope these comments help - and thanks for providing the build scripts.
They make it *much* easier to debug postgresql and contrib modules on
Windows.

Out of curiosity, will the MSVC++ build become the default for 8.3 on
Windows or will it remain MSYS for a bit longer?

Thanks,

Charlie