Re: autotest/package.m4 question [PATCH]

[Eric Blake]

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According to William Pursell on 10/13/2008 1:06 AM:

Hello William, and thanks for the report.

> What is the 'official' gnu position on automake,
> and what's the relationship between autoconf
> and the rest of the autotool chain?

We encourage automake use (many of the autoconf developers also work on
automake), but don't require it, so the goal on this list is to keep
autoconf sufficiently independent to work on its own.  In general, I have
noticed that packages that use autoconf but not automake are often
non-compliant to GNU Coding Standards when it comes to makefile
completeness.  The gnulib project goes one step further, and requires
automake usage.

> 
>  @item
> -The @file{tests/Makefile.in} should be modified so the validation in
> +The @file{tests/Makefile.am} should be modified so the validation in

Right now, automake doesn't nicely support autotest; this should be
directed to the bug-automake list.  The existing text is correct (albeit a
bit confusing in the automake-user's case where Makefile.in is generated,
so the upstream Makefile.am needs the modification instead), so I'm quite
sure what wording to use here, whether or not automake support for
autotest improves.

> 
>  AUTOTEST = $(AUTOM4TE) --language=autotest
> -$(TESTSUITE): $(srcdir)/testsuite.at
> +$(TESTSUITE): $(srcdir)/package.m4 $(srcdir)/testsuite.at

This looks like a correct dependency (at any rate, GNU M4 uses it).  I'll
probably apply this hunk of the patch soon.

> Thirdly, is there any standard way to take a file
> foo.c and generate an autoconfiscated tree structure?

Not that I know of.  What tree structure are you proposing?

- --
Don't work too hard, make some time for fun as well!

Eric Blake             address@hidden
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