In order to get a user up-and-running with a MUMPs-enabled PETSc, I followed this frustrating chain: configure --download-mumps=1 ... Error, no parmetis! configure --download-mumps=1 --download-parmetis=1 Error, no scalapack! configure --download-mumps=1 --download-parmetis=1 --download-scalapack=1 It would be convenient if the PETSc BuildSystem did what other package installers like pip, yum, etc..., do, and grab dependencies that I need based on what I have requested. Additionally, it would make it a lot easier to build PETSc on complicated systems if BuildSystem did a quick dependency/flag check instead off the way it works now (sequential intermixing of really slow and fast configure options). A