Re: config.guess and freedom

[Gary V. Vaughan]

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Ralf Corsepius wrote:
| I don't know how libtool applies config.guess and if/how my
| problems with libtool are connected to config.guess'ing.

Here is a short (but not atypical) example of the sort of thing libtool needs
config.guess for:

case $host_os in
aix3*)
~  # AIX sometimes has problems with the GCC collect2 program.  For some
~  # reason, if we set the COLLECT_NAMES environment variable, the problems
~  # vanish in a puff of smoke.
~  if test "X${COLLECT_NAMES+set}" != Xset; then
~    COLLECT_NAMES=
~    export COLLECT_NAMES
~  fi
~  ;;
esac

We use it frequently:

$ fgrep 'case $host' `which libtool` \
- - /usr/local/share/libtool/m4/*.m4 | wc -l
~     71

| Anyway, my comment was meant generally. I was referring to attempts to
| apply config.guess'ed valued to configuration tables, e.g. something
| similar to this:
| case $host_os in
| redhat7.3) f=/etc/txt.cfg;;
| redhat8.0) f=/etc/sysconfig/txt.cfg;;
| redhat*) f=/etc/foo/txt.cfg;;
| suse9.0) f=/etc/var/txt.cfg;;
| solaris*) f=/etc/config/txt.cfg;;
| ...
| esac

Not dissimilar, excepting your emphasis on linux distributions.  I have no
strong opinion on the linux-gnu argument, but I think your original comment
devalues config.guess unfairly.

Cheers,
        Gary.
- --
Gary V. Vaughan      ())_.  address@hidden,gnu.org}
Research Scientist   ( '/   http://www.oranda.demon.co.uk
GNU Hacker           / )=   http://www.gnu.org/software/libtool
Technical Author   `(_~)_   http://sources.redhat.com/autobook
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