From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Joe Buck To: burley@gnu.org (Craig Burley) Cc: g77-alpha@gnu.org, egcs@cygnus.com, gcc2@cygnus.com Subject: Re: Require GNU Make Somehow? Date: Fri, 01 May 1998 17:18:00 -0000 Message-id: <199805012256.PAA20798@atrus.synopsys.com> References: <199805012119.RAA24803@melange.gnu.org> X-SW-Source: 1998-05/msg00016.html > One problem I've seen a lot is people configuring for separate > source and build directories, then forgetting to use GNU make. Some makes are bad enough that building in the same directory doesn't work either. The correct autoconf way of doing things seems to be to run tests on the make that is found, to see if it has problems. > # ../sourcedir/configure ... > > # make ... > Sorry: you are not using GNU make, FOOBAR make, or BLETCH make, No, because the next release of FOOBAR make may fix the bug. The other is that many people have GNU make installed as gmake; if so, the generated makefile might try to feed itself to gmake. > My guess is that doing it "right" means modifying autoconf, > maybe automake, and the variations gcc/egcs might use that > aren't "vanilla", to do the following: No mods to autoconf or automake would be needed. Adding new stuff to configure.in should be enough. configure.in can ask for any test it wants; autoconf provides a fairly general mechanism for executing a command and seeing if it successful. The user might see Testing 'make' to see if VPATH works ... no Sorry, can't build with --srcdir different from the build directory. You'll need a better make program, such as GNU make. Or Testing 'make' to see if VPATH works ... no Testing 'gmake' to see if VPATH works ... yes ************ IMPORTANT! ******************* ************ IMPORTANT! ******************* You *must* build with gmake rather than with make!!!!! ************ IMPORTANT! ******************* ************ IMPORTANT! ******************* > - Detect that source and build directories are different Easy to do in configure.in > - If so, produce a makefile setup that "slides through" just > fine when processed by a known-working make, but that > produces a diagnostic like the above when processed by > any other make Better to just have configure fail if make is not powerful enough (telling people what their options are).