Re: --with-foo= vs. FOO=${FOO:-foo_default}

[Paul Eggert]

> From: address@hidden
> Date: Sun, 1 Sep 2002 08:57:10 -0400 (EDT)
> 
> So which is the recommended practices way to handle this with autoconf?

The GNU coding standards say this:

   You will note that the categories `--with-' and `--enable-' are
   narrow: they *do not* provide a place for any sort of option you might
   think of.  That is deliberate.  We want to limit the possible
   configuration options in GNU software.  We do not want GNU programs to
   have idiosyncratic configuration options.

So the recommended practice is to not do what you're doing.  :-)

If you really want to do it anyway, despite the recommendation, I
suggest using environment variables.  For example, with GNU a2ps you
can say this:

  with_medium=a4 ./configure

(With a2ps configure you can also use the --with-medium option, but
that runs a bit contrary to the coding standards.)