Custom Query (122 matches)

If there is no version of autoconf installed on the machine, then the script exits with no error message or indication of why it failed. This means that when running a script like prepare_new_stable (for example) that calls run_autotools, the calling script exits with no error message and fails to perform any clean-up actions. It looks like the reason is that the script implicitly assumes in several places that the autoconf command is present and that what needs to be checked is just whether it's the right version.

When creating addlibs files from .pc files, the Makefile's augment PKG_CONFIG_SEARCH_PATH by $prefix/lib/pkgconfig, assuming that .pc files are installed there. This does not work if a user changes the library installation directory via configure's --libdir option.

An easy workaround for a user is to set a link $prefix/lib -> $libdir.

There may be other places where $prefix/lib == $libdir is assumed.

It would be nice to update to a more recent autotools version, which may also fix some open issues.

Lou's thoughts:

	I vote to upgrade. Painful but waaaay overdue. Exotic environments
aside, hanging on to these ancient autotools versions is an ongoing
annoyance on mainstream flavors of unix.

	Tactics and time are serious issues. This is not something to rush
into, and it will take a while to complete. If we really want to take
advantage of the progress in autotools, we need to strip all of our
tweaks (INIT_AUTO_TOOLS, PATCH_LIBTOOL_CYGWIN, PATCH_LIBTOOL_SOLARIS,
PROG_CXX, etc.) and start clean. Then we'll need to find people willing
to test on the various exotic platforms that are represented in coin.m4
to see which tweaks need to be reinstated.

	We should give serious thought to the set of platforms we're willing to
continue to support. Much as it pains me to say it, Solaris is one of
the ones that deserves that thought. It's clear that Oracle cares only
about the server market as a vehicle to sell oracle products. Solaris on
the desktop seems to be abandoned.