Re: autoconf test failures - how to react?

[Paul Eggert]

That latest failure looked like this:

12. tools.at:556: testing ...
./tools.at:559: autoupdate --version | sed 's/.*) //;q'
stdout:
2.59c
./tools.at:564: echo "AC_PREREQ(1.0)" | autoupdate -
./tools.at:567: echo "AC_PREREQ($autoupdate_version)" | autoupdate -
./tools.at:570: echo "AC_PREREQ(999.99)" | autoupdate -
stderr:
/tmp/au822.1499/stdin:1: error: Autoconf version 999.99 or higher is required
/tmp/au822.1499/stdin:1: the top level
autoupdate: failed to run /bin/m4: Invalid seek on non-seekable object

This error message comes from Perl, and makes it look like the Perl
system function cannot run /bin/m4.  That sounds like an error in your
setup somehow.  Still, it is a bit odd that the other tests succeeded,
whereas this one failed.  Perhaps you can investigate it more?
Perhaps Perl cannot run system("echo foo | /bin/m4")?