Re: CC can be a program name *with arguments*

[Charles Wilson]

Gary V. Vaughan wrote:
> +0.5 to remove installed libtool script in HEAD
> -0.5 for branch-2-0
> -1   for branch-1-5

-1 HEAD
-1 branch-2-0
-1 branch-1-5

I have a few concerns about removing this functionality: namely, I 
maintain a bunch of cygwin packages, and some of those use libtool but 
not automake (nor, in one case, autoconf).  Namely, libjpeg(*) and 
ncurses; I'm sure there are others.

(*) libjpeg builds its own libtool during configure, but it's too old to 
build DLLs on cygwin so I replace it on-the-fly with the "installed" 
version of libtool.  Can't relibtoolize or autoconf because libjpeg 
ships ONLY the configure script, not configure.in/ac.

Breaking this behavior would make that much harder -- and would probably 
force me to give up on providing shared libraries for ncurses, at the 
very least.  But, because ncurses is a dependency of so many other 
packages -- and because libtool won't link a DLL if it has non-DLL 
dependencies -- this would cause havoc and ripple thru the whole cygwin 
distro.  Similar effects may occur on other systems -- unless somebody 
wants to fork the upstream ncurses and make it use the "full" autotool 
system; the current maintainer's position on automake is quite clear.

And don't kid yourselves: dropping official support for this behavior is 
EXACTLY the same as deliberately removing the capability...becuase 
bitrot will set in.  Soon, the constructed-during-build libtool script 
will start to require various support files and whatnot scattered in the 
configury directory...and goodbye standalone operation.  Even if the 
intent of those accumulated changes was not deliberately to break 
standalone.

--
Chuck