Hi, How can I extend automake (other than submitting a patch and waiting for automake-1.10 to be released)?
More precisely, when a recipe for a certain feature contains the following instructions: 1. In the top-level directory of your package, create a subdirectory called `bison-po'. It will contain localization files borrowed from the Bison installation. $ mkdir bison-po 2. Into the `bison-po' directory, copy the `Makefile.am' file installed by Bison under `share/bison/bison-po/Makefile.am' in Bison's installation directory. For example, if the `bison' program is installed as `/usr/local/bin/bison', you will find the file under `/usr/local/share/bison/bison-po/Makefile.am'. $ cp /usr/local/share/bison/bison-po/Makefile.am bison-po/Makefile.am The other files in this directory will be created later, automatically. 3. Into the directory containing the GNU autoconf macros used by the package - often called `m4/' - copy the `bison.m4' file installed by Bison under `share/aclocal/bison.m4' in Bison's installation directory. Example: $ cp /usr/local/share/aclocal/bison.m4 m4/bison.m4 4. In the top-level `Makefile.am', add `bison-po' to the SUBDIRS variable and, if present, also to the DIST_SUBDIRS variable. It should be mentioned after directories that contain .y files that are processed by Bison, such as - usually - `src'. Example: SUBDIRS = doc lib src po bison-po tests 5. In the top-level `configure.ac', add `bison-po/Makefile' to the `AC_CONFIG_FILES' command that lists the autogenerated Makefiles. Example: AC_CONFIG_FILES([doc/Makefile lib/Makefile src/Makefile \ po/Makefile.in bison-po/Makefile tests/Makefile]) 6. In the top-level `configure.ac', after the `AM_GNU_GETTEXT' invocation, add an invocation of `BISON_I18N'. As argument, you pass a space-separated list of parser code files generated by Bison. Example: BISON_I18N([rpcalc.c]) The `BISON_I18N' macro is defined in `bison.m4' that you copied earlier. It will cause `configure' to find the values of some variables that are used by `bison-po/Makefile.am'. 8. Finally, invoke `autoreconf', to rebuild the autoconf/automake generated build infrastructure. $ autoreconf Do you see how I could extend 'automake' to simplify this sequence of steps? What I want to do is to ship with bison (and similarly, other programs) an autoconf macro and an automake extension, so that all packages which use bison and a Makefile.am could use the extension by adding a single line to their Makefile.am. Bruno