Re: [PATCH] Add new 'AM_PROG_AR' macro, triggering the 'ar-lib' script.

[Stefano Lattarini]

On Wednesday 15 September 2010, Ralf Wildenhues wrote:
> For now, I didn't get any further than just some comments upon
> comments (a review-review, if you like):
> 
> * Stefano Lattarini wrote on Wed, Sep 15, 2010 at 01:45:17AM CEST:
> > On Tuesday 14 September 2010, Peter Rosin wrote:
> > > Den 2010-09-14 20:14 skrev Stefano Lattarini:
> > > >> +     [am_ar_try='$AR cru libconftest.a conftest.$ac_objext
> > > >> >&AS_MESSAGE_LOG_FD'
> > > > 
> > > > What is the rationale for not redirecting stderr here, along
> > > > with stdout?
> > > 
> > > But stderr is redirected?
> > 
> > Where?  Am I mising something?
> 
> By AC_TRY_EVAL.
Ah! I *was* missing something then!

BTW, I see that the comments to the AC_TRY_EVAL definition in autoconf
boldly warn againt its use:

  # The AC_TRY_EVAL and AC_TRY_COMMAND macros are dangerous and
  # undocumented, and should not be used.
  # They may be removed or their API changed in a future release.
  # Autoconf itself no longer uses these two macros; they are present
  # only for backward compatibility with previous versions of Autoconf

Should we take this warning seriously?  After all, if automake does
not follow good practices w.r.t. use of autoconf, who else will? ;-)

That said, and to be clear: Peter, please don't consider this an 
objection to your patch; your code in m4/ar-lib.m4 is working and 
simple, and I'm not able to provide a viable alternative myself, so 
there's no point in holding you back with such nuisances and 
nitpicking objections. Consider my observations more like a "note to 
self" of sorts, which should remind us that the issue is to be 
considered in future developement.

Thanks,
  Stefano