Re: keeping $exec-prefix et al unexpanded

[Philip Willoughby]

Today, Dan Kegel wrote:

>Philip Willoughby wrote:
>> Since the only reason I've been given to keep the variables unexpanded is
>> so that you can do:
>>
>> ./configure --prefix=/usr
>> make
>> make prefix=/tmp/usr install
>> cd /tmp
>> tar cfz binary-tarball.tgz usr
>>
>> this seems to me to be a bit of a redundant feature.
>
>Not everyone uses automake.  Please don't break this.

Fair enough, if someone uses this feature (which is a little risky in any
case*) leave it in.  But at least let's add expanded versions in as (say)
$prefix_full, $exec_prefix_full and so forth.  Then all of us who've developed
independant, potentially non-portable ways around this annoyance can get rid of
them and get back to writing real code...

* Consider the case when there is a clock skew between the packager's machine
  and the user's machine.  The user will run `make' and build everything, but
  then when they run `make install' the file with the path coded in will be
  regenerated to the incorrect value and everything will break.  Anyone with a
  clue will notice this and fix it, but that's not everyone.

BTW, just out of interest, who doesn't use automake (and why)?

Regards,

Philip Willoughby

Systems Programmer, Department of Computing, Imperial College, London, UK
-- 
echo address@hidden | tr "bizndfohces" "pwgd9ociaku"

Why reinvent the wheel? . . . . . . . . . Because we can make it rounder...