Re: Is that a way to modify tar.m4?

[Stefano Lattarini]

On Wednesday 24 November 2010, xufeng zhang wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I want to modify m4/tar.m4 in automake-1.11.1, however, after I made the 
> change, build automake failed, here is the build error:
> -------------------------------------------------------
>   Compiling:  automake
> -------------------------------------------------------
> CDPATH="${ZSH_VERSION+.}:" && cd . && 
> perllibdir="/home/xufeng/WindRiver/common_pc_automake/build-tools/automake-1.11.1/lib:./lib"
>  
> "/home/xufeng/WindRiver/common_pc_automake/build-tools/automake-1.11.1/aclocal"
>  
> --acdir=m4 -I m4
> /bin/sh: 
> /home/xufeng/WindRiver/common_pc_automake/build-tools/automake-1.11.1/aclocal:
>  
> No such file or directory
> Makefile:337: *** [aclocal.m4] Error 127
> 
Could you please show the *exact* sequence of commands that caused
this error?  Also, are you building from an automake tarball, or
from a cloned git repository?

> I know it is caused by the timestamp mess up,
It's not a mess-up: automake's own aclocal.m4 uses the contents of tar.m4,
and so, when tar.m4 is modified, the automake build system wants to rebuild
aclocal.m4 too.  That's absolutely correct.

> so I want to know if there is a way to do this?
Just a hunch: have you built the automake and aclocal scripts *before*
modifying tar.m4?  If you haven't, well, you should build them first,
because the Automake build system uses the very automake and aclocal
scripts it ships, so you must be sure to build them before hacking any
other part of automake.

> 
> Thanks,
> Xufeng Zhang
> 

HTH,
  Stefano