Autoconf 2.53 is released

[Akim Demaille]

The Autoconf team is extremely pleased to announce Autoconf 2.53.  We
hope it will address your problems, and make your life easier.

Enjoy!

        Akim, Alexandre, Jim, Paul, Tom.

  ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/autoconf/autoconf-2.53.tar.gz   (973 kB)
  ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/autoconf/autoconf-2.53.tar.bz2  (743 kB)

And here are xdelta-style diffs

  ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/autoconf/autoconf-2.52-2.53.xdelta   (215 kB)

Here are the MD5 and SHA1 signatures for the compressed tar files:

42948310deb847982004a3b0d936f7bb  autoconf-2.53.tar.gz
c121b003f51e293c2bf5a6105c721388  autoconf-2.53.tar.bz2
a9fe8460b4ed6f279f3d3f8a73eb39b19e93dc98  autoconf-2.53.tar.gz
c99aa737c0fe24c1cfcf0701e614e69f3ff07209  autoconf-2.53.tar.bz2

NEWS:

** Requirements

  Perl 5.005_03 or later is required: autom4te is written in Perl and is
  needed by autoconf.  autoheader, autoreconf, ifnames, and autoscan are
  rewritten in Perl.

** Documentation

- AC_INIT
  Argument requirements, output variables, defined macros.
- M4sugar, M4sh, Autotest
  First sketch.
- Double quoting macros
  AC_TRY_CPP, AC_TRY_COMPILE, AC_TRY_LINK and AC_TRY_RUN.
- Licensing
  The Autoconf manual is now distributed under the terms of the GNU FDL.
- Section `Hosts and Cross-Compilation'
  Explains the rationale for the 2.5x changes in the cross-compilation
  chain, and in the relationships between build, host, and target
  types.
  Emphasizes that `cross-compilation' == `--host is given'.
  If you are working on compilers etc., be sure to read this section.
- Section `AC_LIBOBJ vs. LIBOBJS'
  Explains why assigning LIBOBJS directly is now an error.
  Details how to update the code.

** configure

- $LINENO
  Now used instead of hard coded line numbers.
  This eases the comparison of `configure's, and diminishes the
  pressure over control version archives.
  Automatic replacement for shells that don't support this feature.
- New output variables
  @builddir@, @top_builddir@, @abs_srcdir@, @abs_top_srcdir@, @abs_builddir@,
  @address@hidden

** Emacs

  Autoconf and Autotest modes are provided.

** Executables

- autom4te
  New, used by the Autoconf suite to cache and speed up most processing.
- --force, -f
  Supported by autom4te, autoconf and autoheader.
- --include, -I
  Replaces --autoconf-dir and --localdir in autoconf, autoheader,
  autoupdate, and autoreconf.
- autoreconf
  No longer passes --cygnus, --foreign, --gnits, --gnu, --include-deps:
  automake options are to be given via AUTOMAKE_OPTIONS.
- autoreconf
  Runs gettextize and libtoolize when appropriate.
- autoreconf
  --m4dir is no longer supported.
- autoreconf
  Now runs only in the specified directories, defaulting to `.',
  but understands AC_CONFIG_SUBDIRS for dependent directories.
  Before, it used to run on all the `configure.ac' found in the
  current tree.
  Independent packages are properly updated.

** Bug fixes

- The top level $prefix is propagated to the AC_CONFIG_SUBDIRS configures.
- AC_TRY_RUN
  Under the user pressure, $? is finally available.  Probably a mistake.
- AC_F77_LIBRARY_LDFLAGS now supports the HP/UX f90 compiler.
- Precious variables accumulation
  config.status could stack several copies of the precious variables
  assignments.
- AC_PATH_PROG and family.
  Works properly when given a literal path.
- AC_FUNC_SETPGRP
  Somewhere since 2.13, the result had been reversed.

** C Macros

- AC_C_BIGENDIAN supports the cross-compiling case.
- AC_C_BIGENDIAN accepts ACTION-IF-TRUE, ACTION-IF-FALSE, and
  ACTION-IF-UNKNOWN arguments.  All are facultative, and the default
  for ACTION-IF-TRUE is to define WORDS_BIGENDIAN like AC_C_BIGENDIAN
  always did.
- AC_C_LONG_DOUBLE now succeeds only if `long double' has more range or
  precision than `double'.

** Generic macros

- AC_INIT
  It now defines the preprocessor symbols PACKAGE_NAME,
  PACKAGE_TARNAME, PACKAGE_VERSION, PACKAGE_STRING, and
  PACKAGE_BUGREPORT.

- AC_INIT
  Admits a fourth optional parameter: the tar name.

- AC_CONFIG_COMMANDS, HEADERS, FILES, LINKS.
  Provide the user with srcdir, ac_srcdir, ac_top_srcdir, ac_builddir,
  ac_top_builddir, ac_abs_srcdir, ac_abs_top_srcdir, ac_abs_builddir,
  ac_abs_top_builddir.

- AC_CONFIG_COMMANDS, HEADERS, FILES, LINKS and AC_OUTPUT.
  Are much less expensive when using long lists of files.

- AC_PREFIX_PROGRAM
  Works with shell variables, and non alphanumeric names.

** Library macros

- AC_FUNC_STRERROR_R now sets STRERROR_R_CHAR_P, not HAVE_WORKING_STRERROR_R,
  because POSIX 1003.1-200x draft 7 says strerror_r returns int, not char *.

- AC_FUNC_STRTOD substitutes POW_LIB.

- AC_FUNC_STRNLEN
  New.