Re: RFC: ./configure or ./config.status --clean

[Akim Demaille]

>>>>> "Peter" == Peter Eisentraut <address@hidden> writes:

Peter> Akim Demaille writes:
>> Because I fail to see the advantage for Automake to have to clean
>> itself, rather than asking the cleaning.

Peter> Automake already does all the other cleaning, so you could say
Peter> it's quite good at it.  Autoconf hasn't done any cleaning so
Peter> far.

>> That's better to my eyes, also because a list of files might not
>> always be the right thing to do.

Peter> Why not?

I don't know.  Maybe someday some test will be need before cleaning.
Maybe something in config.site will change something between two runs.

I just have no idea.  It's just the principle.

Let me wrap the question in the other direction: what is better with
providing a list of files to remove?  How does your solution work when
there is no longer the top Makefile, for whatever reason, but there
remains other files?

Using ./configure --clean, you never face this problem.