Re: 'make dist' and m4 directory

[Ralf Wildenhues]

Hi Jeffrey,

* Jeffrey Sheinberg wrote on Mon, Jun 27, 2005 at 01:27:35AM CEST:
> 
> I intended to put some local macros into the m4/ directory.  These
> macros would be needed for the ./configure script to work,
> therefore they need to be included into the dist tarball.

But your m4 directory is empty.  So, you could have just left out all
that.

> If you do agree, then my point is that automake should be smart
> enough to recognize that the m4/ directory be included in the dist
> tarball.

Automake would not include everything below m4/ even if there were
macros in there which aclocal used, but only the actually used macro
files.  This is a feature: For example, m4/CVS/ should not be
distributed.

*snip*
>       ACLOCAL_AMFLAGS = -I m4
> 
> Likewise, now automake has another reason to include the m4/
> directory in the dist tarball.

No, see above.

> I repeat, the problem is that without "EXTRA_DIST += m4", make
> distcheck fails, because the m4/ directory has not been included
> in the dist tarball.

I agree that it is a bug that distcheck fails that way.  I don't agree
that Automake should include the empty directory.  Just my two cents,
though.

Regards,
Ralf