Re: libtool and autoconf

[Gary V. Vaughan]

On Mon, Sep 03, 2001 at 09:50:10AM +0200, Alexander Mai wrote:
> On Mon, Sep 03, 2001 at 01:13:29AM +0100, Gary V. Vaughan wrote:
> > On Wed, Aug 29, 2001 at 11:30:14AM +0200, Alexander Mai wrote:
> > > As for all auto* projects you manage all the time to avoid writing
> > > at a prominent place in the docs which versions of the other
> > > tools are required, I really wonder why?!?
> > 
> >   $ egrep -i 'auto(conf|make)' ~/devel/savannah/libtool/NEWS
> >   * Now bootstraps with autoconf-2.50 and automake-1.4-p4.
> >     Automake >= 1.5 will install stripped libraries with "make 
> > install-strip".
> >   * Documentation improvements; recommend automake users to insert 
> > libtool.m4
> >     (requires automake 1.4).
> >   * Automake support for Libtool now uses the LTLIBRARIES primary.  See
> >     the Automake documentation for more information.
> >   * Full support for Automake 1.2 (including ansi2knr features).
> > 
> > Not guilty.
> 
> Errrr...
> NEWS is a summary from even old and outdated stuff, is it?
> Installation/usage requirements should be in the docs,
> libtool.texi clearly visible.

On the contrary, NEWS is exactly the file users are supposed to read
whenever you untar a new release.  It is after all a list of "user
visible changes since the last release".

> Does this mean that there won't be anything
> beyond 1.4 which is happy with autoconf 2.13?

Pretty much.  Alpha releases leading to libtool-1.5 (and beyond) will
definitely need recent autoconf and automake releases, but I'll accept
patches to make libtool.m4 and ltdl.m4 useful for projects that won't
(or can't) upgrade -- if some one else has the time to put the work in.

> > > (and if there's a kind soul around please tell it to the
> > > other auto* maintainers ;-)
> > > Or just point me to the right place in the docs ...
> > 
> > Chack the NEWS file for user visible changes between releases.
> 
> To repeat myself: I don't think that any GNU or whatever
> standard forces people to read a ChangeLog/NEWS or whatever
> files which are usually just for 'insiders' to follow
> development? Why should a new user to libtool care
> about it's history?

Agreed in the case of ChangeLog.  But if you are upgrading from one
release of libtool to another, why _wouldn't_ you want to know what
has changed?

Cheers,
        Gary.
-- 
  ())_. Gary V. Vaughan     gary@(oranda.demon.co.uk|gnu.org)
  ( '/  Research Scientist  http://www.oranda.demon.co.uk       ,_())____
  / )=  GNU Hacker          http://www.gnu.org/software/libtool  \'      `&
`(_~)_  Tech' Author        http://sources.redhat.com/autobook   =`---d__/