Re: Ignoring failures in AC_OUTPUT

[Ralf Wildenhues]

Hi Kristis,

* Kristis Makris wrote on Tue, Mar 28, 2006 at 06:58:59PM CEST:
> On Tue, 2006-03-28 at 11:21 +0200, Ralf Wildenhues wrote:
> 
> > What you could do is just not list these files in AC_CONFIG_FILES.
> 
> I'm not using AC_CONFIG_FILES at all.

Well, in modern (Autoconf 2.50+) times,
  AC_OUTPUT([files ..])

is just equivalent to
  AC_CONFIG_FILES([files ..])
  AC_OUTPUT

> > Then you need to adjust your build steps so that after configure is run,
> > you do
> >   ./config.status extra/Makefile extra2/Makefile
> 
> Ahh... Thanks. I have a feeling this will now need special logic when
> building rpms. The './configure; make' mentality is no longer sound.

Well, yes, somewhere you do need to get the necessary differentiation.
If you rather want to do it by a configure argument, like
  --enable-special-code

or a more appropriate naming, you can do that as well.  The manual
explains how to use AC_ARG_ENABLE; be sure to also read
  info Autoconf "Configuration Actions"

on how to invoke AC_CONFIG_FILES in the presence of optional arguments.
This may seem less dirty to you, and it will allow for optional output
files at configure time.

> Why do I feel dirty all of the sudden ? I was hoping for an
> AC_OUTPUT_IF_PRESENT-like macro.

Well, to me you did not specify enough details of your problem, so that
was one guess.

Cheers,
Ralf