Re: 'make dist' and m4 directory

[Ralf Corsepius]

On Sun, 2005-06-26 at 14:32 -0400, Jeffrey Sheinberg wrote:
> Ralf Corsepius writes:
>  > On Thu, 2005-06-23 at 15:44 -0400, Jeffrey Sheinberg wrote:
>  > > John Ling writes:
>  > >  > Hi Ralf, yes that's exactly what I am trying to do.
>  > >  > 
>  > >  > Since I'm using automake 1.7.7 then this is why it isn't including 
> the 
>  > >  > m4 directory.
>  > >  > 
>  > >  > I'll just use EXTRA_DIST for now then until I upgrade to a more 
> recent 
>  > >  > Automake.
>  > >  > 
>  > > 
>  > > Hi,
>  > > 
>  > > I needed to use use EXTRA_DIST in a similar situation with
>  > > Automake version 1.9.3, in order for make distcheck to work.
>  > >
>  > > In my case, the m4 directory was empty, so as the following
>  > > comments describe it, I consider this to be a bug in Automake.
>  > 
>  > I think you are missing something. automake-1.9.x will distribute all
>  > the m4-files being used by a configure script, it will not distribute
>  > "all files below m4/"
>  > 
>  > So, if you're not using the *.m4's inside of your m4/ directory,
>  > automake will not distribute anything.
> 
> Since there are no *.m4 files in the m4/ directory, of course
> automake cannot distribute them, but in order for make distclean
> to work, the m4/ directory needs to be included in the dist
> tarball.

I fail to understand what you are trying to say.

AC_CONFIG_MACRO_DIR (DIR) is defined as:
     Future versions of `autopoint', `libtoolize', `aclocal' and
     `autoreconf' will use directory DIR as the location of additional
     local Autoconf macros.  Be sure to call this macro directly from
     `configure.ac' so that tools that install macros for `aclocal' can
     find the declaration before `--trace' can be called safely.

> As I pointed out, automake cetainly has enough information to
> automatically include the m4/ directory in the dist tarball, but
> it does not do this - the workaround being EXTRA_DIST.
This is not how it is supposed to work.

> $ grep m4  configure.ac Makefile.am
> configure.ac:AC_CONFIG_MACRO_DIR([m4])
> Makefile.am:ACLOCAL_AMFLAGS = -I m4
> Makefile.am:# Workaround a bug in automake - inclusion of the "m4" directory 
> should
> Makefile.am:# be triggered by the presence of either, 
> "AC_CONFIG_MACRO_DIR([m4])" in
> Makefile.am:# "configure.ac", or "ACLOCAL_AMFLAGS = -I m4" in "Makefile.am".
IMO, what you are writing above doesn't make any sense.

> Makefile.am:EXTRA_DIST += m4

Ralf