Alexandre Oliva wrote:
> That's why I suggest that this option of testing alternate extensions
> be enabled only when a certain autoconf macro is called. It mustn't
> be automatic, precisely because it requires support from the
> developer.
Perhaps I'm missing something here, but what is the developer supposed
to do to "support" this ? Looking back at how this thread has evolved,
it is a really complex issue involving weird compiler's peculiarities,
builtin make rules etc. I think if the "portability experts" in the
automake/autoconf community have a hard time figuring out a working
solution, how should the average maintainer ?
I think that if it is decided to support suffix mangling for weird
compilers, it must be done through automake/autoconf, and automake
actually has the hard part. The tests should be performed
automatically, and details should be hidden from users as well
as maintainers.
What I could go with, though, is to say that if such a feature was
implemented in a future autoconf version, it would be qualified
"experimental" (since it is possible that these tests may
break compatibility on some systems initially) and must
be explicitly activated by maintainers by calling, say,
AC_CHECK_SOURCE_SUFFIX before doing compiler checks.
--
Martin Wilck <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Institute for Tropospheric Research, Permoserstr. 15, D-04318 Leipzig, Germany
Tel. +49-341-2352151 / Fax +49-341-2352361
