Matt,
<div><br></div><div>Can you the ability for self.installNeeded to check the date from hg log for the particular package? Something such as:</div><div><br></div><div>hg log -l 1 config/PETSc/packages/metis.py --template &#39;{date|isodatesec}&#39;</div>


<div>2012-03-20 15:11:27 -0500</div><div><br></div><div>and then redownload &amp;&amp; reinstall based on this information (as well as the current method of checking options written to a file). Since buildsystem is already written in python, this could be implemented with a fancy call to a mercurial command server, or whatever you prefer.</div>


<div><br></div><div>While we&#39;re at it, can the mkfile argument self.installNeeded be optional and default to self.package?</div><div><br></div><div>Thanks!</div>