Re: BUILT_SOURCES called on `make dist` even if the built sources should not be included in the dist

[Jerry Lundström]

Hi Nick,

On 9/17/19 8:25 PM, Nick Bowler wrote:
> ... I just ran this example with Automake 1.16.1 and neither ext/built.c
> nor ext/built.o are included in the distribution tar file generated by
> 'make dist'.

Exactly! Then why are they built during `make dist`?

    $ make dist
    make  dist-gzip am__post_remove_distdir='@:'
    make[1]: Entering directory '/home/buildbot/tmp'
 >> echo "int sdkjfhskjhfskjd(void){ return 0; }" > ext/built.c
 >> gcc -c ext/built.c -o ext/built.o


My non-example project has a 3rd party library that needs to be built
before I can start building my software, this library is included in the
project and I run a simple `cd dir && make` in it.

With v1.16 this step is executed during `make dist` and using
`EXTRA_DIST` for that whole directory would also mean that _the built
library_ would be included in the dist.

This change to were `BUILT_SOURCES` is used feel like a quick fix, would
have been a lot nicer if something like `BUILT_DIST_SOURCES` had been
added instead of changing the meaning of an existing step.


Also, the documentation is now wrong:


<https://www.gnu.org/software/automake/manual/html_node/Built-Sources-Example.html#Built-Sources-Example>

> However, as said earlier, BUILT_SOURCES applies only to the all, check, and 
> install targets. It still fails if you try to run ‘make foo’ explicitly: 

Cheers,
Jerry