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Re: config.guess and freedom (was: 1.8 and mkdir_p)
- From: Bob Friesenhahn <bfriesen at simple dot dallas dot tx dot us>
- To: Bob Proulx <bob at proulx dot com>
- Cc: automake at gnu dot org
- Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2004 11:18:16 -0600 (CST)
- Subject: Re: config.guess and freedom (was: 1.8 and mkdir_p)
On Tue, 13 Jan 2004, Bob Proulx wrote:
>
> > If the releases are all that similar, why not use:
> >
> > i686-GnuLinux-*
> >
> > as your test, and provide the "popular" distributions in the 3rd field?
> >
> > The "magic" command has a large database of selections on it; using this
> > sort of mechanism should greatly ease the burder on the config.*
> > maintainers.
>
> That sounds like the architecture and philosophy of imake.
Not exactly. The philosophy of imake is that the imake configuration
is primarily vendor maintained. This is/was reasonable for X11 since
most vendors were interested in supporting/offering X11.
Autoconf does not benefit from that environment.
Long ago I wrote a magazine article about Autoconf and feature-based
testing (see "http://www.byte.com/art/9711/sec4/art2.htm";). At that
time feature-based testing was relatively new and was being
incorporated in open source packages. Based on the ease of installing
most open source packages that provide a "configure" script, it seems
that feature-based testing has proven to be a resounding success.
Bob
======================================
Bob Friesenhahn
bfriesen@simple.dallas.tx.us
http://www.simplesystems.org/users/bfriesen