jg> I expect those macros were intended to be used with signed values,
jg> and now they are being used with unsigned values as well, which is
jg> bad.
No, I don't think so. I don't remember the details but my recollection
is that they were specifically designed to work with systems which used
either signed or unsigned values, without having to test for
that... because there's no way to test for that (remember that if you
want to be able to cross-compile, and I most definitely DO want make to
be cross-compilable, you cannot actually _RUN_ any programs during
autoconf time. You can only compile/link programs).