Hi Ralf, > > $ autoconf > > configure.ac:1: warning: AC_INIT: not a literal: 2.48++ (2010-07-03) > > > > Yes, in some packages, the version number consists of two parts, separated > > by > > a space. > > The space isn't a what triggers the warning here, it's the parentheses > around the date.
There is no reason to warn about them: In the generated configure file, the version string appears in comments, inside single-quotes, inside double-quotes, and in here documents. In all these places, parentheses and spaces are perfectly fine. > My current recommendation on this, since it's a warning only, is to > either ignore it, or use -Wno-syntax to silence it for now. WDYT? There is no reason for the warning, because the version string does not contain characters that would be dangerous in comments, inside single-quotes, inside double-quotes, or in here documents (namely newline, single-quote, double-quote, backslash, dollar). Therefore the warning should not be present. > OTOH, at least for Automake, the space is also a > problem, because $(PACKAGE)-$(VERSION) is used for distdir and not > consistently quoted. Sure, you may not use Automake for your package, > but that means there would need to be a stricter test in Automake for > the version string. We are discussing AC_INIT here, not AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE. Btw, Autoconf's PACKAGE_VERSION variable is a different beast than Automake's VERSION variable. [1] Bruno [1] http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/automake/2009-05/msg00145.html
