On Wed, Oct 28, 2020 at 8:40 AM Ole Tange <ta...@gnu.org> wrote: > > make[3]: Entering directory '/home/ space /parallel-20200922/src' > rm /home/ space /bin/sem || true > rm: cannot remove '/home/': Is a directory > rm: cannot remove 'space': No such file or directory > rm: cannot remove '/bin/sem': No such file or directory > ln -s parallel /home/ space /bin/sem > ln: target '/bin/sem' is not a directory
The commands that can't handle spaces in $(prefix) are coming from the install-exec-hook in src/Makefile.am: install-exec-hook: rm $(DESTDIR)$(bindir)/sem || true $(LN_S) parallel $(DESTDIR)$(bindir)/sem Compare the installation rules generated by Automake (src/Makefile.in): install-binSCRIPTS: $(bin_SCRIPTS) @$(NORMAL_INSTALL) @list='$(bin_SCRIPTS)'; test -n "$(bindir)" || list=; \ if test -n "$$list"; then \ echo " $(MKDIR_P) '$(DESTDIR)$(bindir)'"; \ $(MKDIR_P) "$(DESTDIR)$(bindir)" || exit 1; \ fi; \ ... while read type dir files; do \ if test "$$dir" = .; then dir=; else dir=/$$dir; fi; \ test -z "$$files" || { \ echo " $(INSTALL_SCRIPT) $$files '$(DESTDIR)$(bindir)$$dir'"; \ $(INSTALL_SCRIPT) $$files "$(DESTDIR)$(bindir)$$dir" || exit $$?; \ } \ ; done This is a mess, but see how it _always_ expands $(DESTDIR)$(bindir) inside shell quotes? To handle spaces in installation directories correctly, you have to do the same thing in every rule you write yourself. (Even this is not enough to handle installation directories with quotes in their names. I think that one's just hopeless.) zw