[Gnu-arch-users] Re: File time stamp preservation

[Miles Bader]

"Parker, Ron" <address@hidden> writes:
> My question is what I a good way to handle this so that anyone that may
> check this project out later will not need an ancient version of auto* and
> so that files are not blindly retouched when they may actually be out of
> date?

I think the usual way to handle this with auto* is to have the
re-autoconf rules only invoked if the user has explicitly enabled
`maintainer mode' via `configure --enable-maintainer-mode' (which you
wouldn't do if you didn't have the proper tools installed).

If you're using automake I think you can just use AM_MAINTAINER_MODE;
emacs uses its own version, like this:

configure.in:

   AC_ARG_ENABLE(maintainer-mode,
   [  --enable-maintainer-mode enable make rules and dependencies not useful
                             (and sometimes confusing) to the casual installer],
         USE_MAINTAINER_MODE=$enableval,
         USE_MAINTAINER_MODE=no)
   if test $USE_MAINTAINER_MODE = yes; then
     MAINT=
   else
     MAINT=#
   fi
   AC_SUBST(MAINT)

Makefile.in:

   ${srcdir}/configure: @MAINT@ ${srcdir}/configure.in
           cd ${srcdir} && autoconf

   $(srcdir)/src/config.in: $(srcdir)/src/stamp-h.in
           @true
   $(srcdir)/src/stamp-h.in: @MAINT@ ${srcdir}/configure.in
           cd ${srcdir} && autoheader
           rm -f $(srcdir)/src/stamp-h.in
           echo timestamp > $(srcdir)/src/stamp-h.in

-Miles
-- 
"I distrust a research person who is always obviously busy on a task."
   --Robert Frosch, VP, GM Research