Re: Generating 'cat' pages on make install

[Jason Curl]

Benoit SIGOURE wrote:
> On Nov 4, 2007, at 2:40 PM, Jason Curl wrote:
>
> > So let's assume I've got a command on my build environment
> >
> > groff -Tascii -mandoc myman.3 | col -b > mycat.3
> >
> > I might even extend this to generate HTML instead of ASCII.
> >
> > Later I'd be implementing a Perl script to convert what is in code 
> > comments to something else to then generate the man pages. These man 
> > pages document an API.
> [...]
> > Well, may be I'll rephrase the question: Given a list of man pages in 
> > my Makefile.am, how can I write or extend automake (hopefully easily) 
> > to use that list that is already defined to run a command and copy it 
> > somewhere on make install, using the example I've provided?
> >
> > I'd like to keep it in Automake if possible rather than having 
> > preconfigure, postconfigure scripts.
>
> Hi Jason,
> there are plenty of scripts to convert man pages to HTML 
> (google://man2html) you don't need to write yours ;)
> what I'd do in such a situation is:
Later I'd rather have all documentation embedded in my C code to reduce 
maintenance a little and a Perl script to extract what I want from C 
code was what I was referring to. I've started looking at how glibc does 
it. man2html is only the last step.

But I like your tip.

> --Makefile.am--------------------------------------------------------
> man3_MANS = myman.3 foo.3
> man1_MANS = otherman.1
> html_DATA = $(man3_MANS:.3=.html) $(man1_MANS:.1=.html)
>
> .1.html:
>     $(MAN2HTML) $^ -o $@
> .3.html:
>     $(MAN2HTML) $^ -o $@
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> You don't need to change Automake or whatever.  It's pretty simple and 
> self-contained.
That's what I like, neat, small and self contained. Makes programming an 
art. But I'm having a bit of a programmers block.

I've implemented the following:

-----8<---- Makefile.am ----
man_MANS =                                                      \
   libmofo.3                                                   \
   convertstring.3                                             \
   mofobuilddate.3 mofobuildhost.3 mofoversion.3 mofoendian.3  \
   smsread.3

html_DATA = $(man_MANS:.3=.html)

CLEANFILES = $(html_DATA)

EXTRA_DIST = $(man_MANS)

all-local: $(html_DATA)

# When we 'make' we create the .html files
SUFFIXES = .html
.3.html:
   @MAN2HTML@ $^ > $@
-----8<---- configure.ac ----
...
AC_PATH_PROG(MAN2HTML,man2html,man2html)
...
--------------------

I haven't figured out how to define the variable $(MAN2HTML) instead 
using automake substitution with @address@hidden Did I miss something?

How can I prevent the rule from running if the user doesn't have 
'man2html' in their path? I don't think I can just use a "dummy" command 
like echo, as the /usr/bin/install command would return an error:

/usr/bin/install -c -m 644 
'../../../../code/libmofo/man/convertstring.html' 
'/home/jcurl/mofo/build/windows/release/share/doc/libm
ofo/convertstring.html'
/usr/bin/install: cannot stat 
`../../../../code/libmofo/man/convertstring.html': No such file or directory
make[3]: *** [install-htmlDATA] Error 1
make[3]: Leaving directory `/home/jcurl/mofo/build/windows/libmofo/man'
make[2]: *** [install-am] Error 2
make[2]: Leaving directory `/home/jcurl/mofo/build/windows/libmofo/man'
make[1]: *** [install-recursive] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/jcurl/mofo/build/windows/libmofo'
make: *** [install-recursive] Error 1

Definitely not what I want...