cross-tools

[Dr Tomaž Slivnik]

I am writing in response to the following message printed by "./ 
configure":

> checking for powerpc64-apple-darwin-ranlib... no
> checking for ranlib... ranlib
> configure: WARNING: In the future, Autoconf will not detect cross- 
> tools
> whose name does not start with the host triplet.  If you think this
> configuration is useful to you, please write to address@hidden

Please note that on Mac OS X, there is only one compiler (gcc) and  
supporting tools, which compile for ppc, ppc64, and i386  
architectures. So these tools act as both native tools and as cross- 
compiler tools. Implementing the change proposed above will break the  
default functionality on Mac OS X (and Darwin generally). I certainly  
rely on being able to use the present functionality to build multi- 
architecture binary files.

On a related note, I would like to see functionality in autoconf in  
the future which will allow me to build a multi-architecture binary  
in a single "./configure ; make" pass. Currently, this is not  
possible as many/most configure scripts appear to try to guess the  
endianness of the host CPU and the bit-size of things like "long" and  
hard code it into configuration files before compilation begins. This  
does not allow simultaneous compilation for both PowerPC and Intel  
architecture, or simultaneous compilation for 32 bit and 64 bit  
architectures.

Thank you.

Yours sincerely,

Tomaž Slivnik