Re: [CFT] Shell functionization patch (if you don't know what that means, it's faster Autoconf and leaner configure scripts)

[Paolo Bonzini]

>> Perl is also quite rapidly losing popularity to other scripting languages
>> such as Python and Ruby.  There was an over five year span without a Perl
> 
> Popularity shouldn't be a metric here, in that case sh would would lose, too.

Not really, sh is not going to be replaced for system tasks, while the
choice of language for tasks such as text manipulation is more subject
to changes in time.  Autoconf lags many years behind current fashions
(by design): 5 years ago it used sed; now it uses awk; and when the next
change is made nobody can be sure that the choice will be Perl.

> Anyhow, I would like to be able to use Perl (or any other language) if
> it is found during the configure process.

You can already do that.  Whatever is found is placed in $PERL.

Paolo