Re: RFE: allow for computed version number

[Bruno Haible]

Ralf Wildenhues wrote:
> > >     AM_INIT_VERSION([$$version], [version=`sh $(top_srcdir)/gen-version`])
> 
> Here's a slightly different idea.  The basic unit of granularity in
> makefiles is a target, or a file.  The problem we're facing is that the
> version is clumped together with all other information inside
> config.status, config.h, Makefile files.  So let's separate it by
> declaring a special file that contains the version (whether that be
> .version or another name), say, by some AM_VERSION_FILE macro.

That's a good working hypothesis. If you can add something like this to
automake, it would solve ca. 2/3 of the problem.

Later on we can see how to accommodate the remaining use-case of a
lazily computed version.

Bruno