Re: AC_CHECK_LIB

[Paul Eggert]

> Date: Tue, 9 Oct 2001 10:14:17 +0200
> From: Holger Veit <address@hidden>

> > AC_CHECK_LIB(cposix,strerror)
> > ...
> > But please don't ask me why AC_CHECK_LIB successes on OS/2 while it
> > fails on Linux (both don't have a cposix).
> 
> This test is Linuxish-only, and entirely WRONG!

We've known for some time that AC_CHECK_LIB has undesirable semantics,
but we haven't come up with replacement semantics that we're happy
with, and there are some backward compatibility issues.

In the meantime, I suggest using AC_SEARCH_LIBS instead.  That is,
you can replace

  AC_CHECK_LIB(cposix,strerror)

with

  AC_SEARCH_LIBS(strerror, cposix)

For example, here's what's in the latest Autoconf CVS:

  AC_DEFUN([AC_ISC_POSIX], [AC_SEARCH_LIBS(strerror, cposix)])

(Perhaps the Autoconf manual should deprecate AC_CHECK_LIB until we
can figure out what it should do.  :-)