On Wed, 2008-04-23 at 06:11 -0600, Eric Blake wrote: > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- > Hash: SHA1 > > According to Ralf Corsepius on 4/23/2008 2:44 AM: > |> Really, we require newer m4 because older versions caused autoconf to > |> create erroneous configure scripts, and those errors were very difficult > |> to diagnose. Not to make life harder for you. > | It might be inconvenient to you but reality simply is as simple as: > | Autoconf-2.62 has proven to miss its objective: portability. > > Wait a minute. You are still mixing apples and oranges. I don't think I am. It's as simple as this: You broke autoconf's portability and usability.
Autoconf has regressed from once having been a portable tool into one of amoungst many GNU-centric proprietary tools - It's the defect many people have accused the autotools for for many years - You proved them to be right. > Autoconf's > objective is to output portable configure scripts, and this triumphs over > any concerns about being portable itself. The reason that Autoconf itself > uses non-portable tools such as new enough GNU m4 and perl, in spite of > the GNU Coding Standards stating that these tools are not to be used in > building portable programs, is that it was decided long ago that > developers are smart enough to install proper prerequisites if they want > to then generate something that DOES comply with GCS for their end users. I am well aware about this statement: Ask yourself why the perl in (esp. automake) is frozen to an ancient perl-standard and did not adopt "modern perl dialects". Adopting modern perl would have essentially the same impact as autoconf-2.62+gm4 has, except that upgrading perl is not as trivial as it is to upgrade gm4. Let's stop this thread here. I don't think, it will anywhere. Ralf