m4 problems

[Patrick West]

I am not getting the results that I would expect from some simple
commands. I am just now learning m4.

This is what I type on the command line:
m4 --interactive
define('foo', 'hello world')

foo
foo
'foo'
'foo'

define(foo, 'hello world')

foo
'hello world'
undefine(foo)

foo
'hello world'

dumpdef(foo)
stdin:6: m4: Undefined name 'hello world'

dumpdef('foo')
stdin:7: m4: Undefined name ''hello world''

Then I hit control D and get out of there.

I would expect that after I define foo the first time, when I type foo I
would get 'hello world', but instead it just prints foo to output. If I
define foo without using the quotes around foo then I can't use dumpdef,
undefine or anything else using foo because it always replaces foo with
'hello world'.

I am using m4 1.4 on SunOS 5.7 sparc Ultra 10.

Patrick West
address@hidden