From: Alexandre Oliva (oliva@dcc.unicamp.br)
Date: Sat Jan 09 1999 - 16:49:21 EST
On Jan 9, 1999, Godmar Back <gback@cs.utah.edu> wrote:
> I am convinced that AM_MAINTAINER_MODE (at the very least) is the way to go
> until automake becomes as established and stable as configure.
I don't think it is. Experienced people have agreed that it should go
away; only novices with automake find it strange that Makefile.in
should always be up-to-date. If you think straight, you'll see it's
not that strange at all :-)
> Hey, the only thing I dislike about automake right now is that it
> flat out broke my ability to build a working kaffe.
Try the `./missing automake' tip, after making sure you don't have
modified local copies of any autoconf/automake files. If you do,
remove them and update again, that should be enough for you to build,
now and always.
> Is this an irrational fear of new things? I dont' think so.
Neither do I. You're just annoyed because you're still facing it as
something that doesn't work exactly as you expect. It's just a matter
of getting used to the minor differences, and take the time to start
to appreciate them.
> I'll even ask our admins to update to automake 1.3.45.beta3-f if
> that's what it takes.
You don't have to wait for them to do that. automake is just a perl
script with a couple of data files that takes 0.5 Meg to install. You
just have to check it out from sourceware.cygnus.com, configure it
with an appropriate prefix and install it yourself. Same for
autoconf.
> I really just want things to work.
Remember when you had to install libz, libgmp, libgif, libjpeg and
libpng for Kaffe to build successfully? (I had to do it; maybe you
use GNU/Linux only...) autoconf and automake are just minor pieces of
software when compared to all those others. Don't take them as an
unbearable burden: it's a very light one!
> Like an OS that's at its best if it does not get in the way, a build
> environment is best if it "just works".
That's exactly what you'll do as soon as you stop complaining about it
and put the tips I've written to you into action. :-)
Or get updated versions of autoconf and automake, which is probably
best in the long run, since you'll certainly want to modify
configure.in and Makefile.am.
--
Alexandre Oliva http://www.dcc.unicamp.br/~oliva aoliva@{acm.org}
oliva@{dcc.unicamp.br,gnu.org,egcs.cygnus.com,samba.org}
Universidade Estadual de Campinas, SP, Brasil
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