Re: autogen.sh warnings

[Bruce Dubbs]

Felix Zielcke wrote:
> Am Mittwoch, den 09.12.2009, 16:19 -0600 schrieb Bruce Dubbs:
> > config.guess, config.sub, missing, mkinstalldirs, and install-sh are 
> > only copied from /usr/share/automake-<version> as a part of automake. 
> > AFAICT, they are not used in GRUB.  I'm pretty sure they are the same
> > on 
> > all architectures, but I could be wrong about that. 
>
> config.guess and config.sub are used by configure.

Called yes, and it will give errors if not present, but is the output 
used?  Looking at configure, I don't think so.

> mkinstalldirs is used by the generated Makefile.

It looks like a part of the generated install and dist targets.  Looking 
at the code of mkinstalldirs, it fundamentally does a mkdir -p.  It can 
change the permissions of the final directory, but that is not used by 
the Makefile.  It does do some cleanup for NextStep and OpenStep and 
makes sure that GNU mkdir is used on Sun.   The odds this will change in 
the future are very small.

> Looks like configure checks if install-sh is there but except of this it
> isn't used.

> missing isn't used because we don't use automake and maintainer mode.

Looks that way to me too.

  -- Bruce

P.S.  Some may ask why I am putting so much into the warnings generated 
by the build process.  There are a few reasons.  First, I feel that 
persistent warnings tend to make developers ignore ALL warnings and that 
makes it very easy to miss something relevant.  Second, it gives new 
developers a feeling that the original developers paid attention to 
details and will give confidence that the rest of the package is 
correct.  Third, it scratches an itch for me.  :)