[newbie] How to check for an "install" program

[Stefano Sabatini]

Hail to all autoconfers.

I'm trying to use autoconf for a project of mine. I would like to
insert a check in the configure file for some install program.

The right command to use seems to be:
AC_PROG_INSTALL

but I get all the times this error trying to run the autogenerated configure:

configure: error: cannot find install-sh or install.sh in "." "./.." "./../.."

The relevant code in configure is this:

ac_aux_dir=
for ac_dir in "$srcdir" "$srcdir/.." "$srcdir/../.."; do
  if test -f "$ac_dir/install-sh"; then
    ac_aux_dir=$ac_dir
    ac_install_sh="$ac_aux_dir/install-sh -c"
    break
  elif test -f "$ac_dir/install.sh"; then
    ac_aux_dir=$ac_dir
    ac_install_sh="$ac_aux_dir/install.sh -c"
    break
  elif test -f "$ac_dir/shtool"; then
    ac_aux_dir=$ac_dir
    ac_install_sh="$ac_aux_dir/shtool install -c"
    break
  fi
done
if test -z "$ac_aux_dir"; then
  { { echo "$as_me:$LINENO: error: cannot find install-sh or install.sh in 
\"$srcdir\" \"$srcdir/..\" \"$srcdir/../..\"" >&5
echo "$as_me: error: cannot find install-sh or install.sh in \"$srcdir\" 
\"$srcdir/..\" \"$srcdir/../..\"" >&2;}
   { (exit 1); exit 1; }; }

so configure is looking for an install program in the source tree,
that is not at all what I meant.

The following part (that isn't executed) seems to do what I want, but
it doesn't seem to look for the path of the gnu install program in my
system (Debian Etch) /usr/bin/install.

# Find a good install program.  We prefer a C program (faster),
# so one script is as good as another.  But avoid the broken or
# incompatible versions:
# SysV /etc/install, /usr/sbin/install
# SunOS /usr/etc/install
# IRIX /sbin/install
# AIX /bin/install
# AmigaOS /C/install, which installs bootblocks on floppy discs
# AIX 4 /usr/bin/installbsd, which doesn't work without a -g flag
# AFS /usr/afsws/bin/install, which mishandles nonexistent args
# SVR4 /usr/ucb/install, which tries to use the nonexistent group "staff"
# OS/2's system install, which has a completely different semantic
# ./install, which can be erroneously created by make from ./install.sh.

So which is the right way to check for an install program?

Sorry for the eventually silly question.

Kind regards.
-- 
Stefano Sabatini
Linux user number 337176 (see http://counter.li.org)