Re: New Software License idea: "The Freedom License."

[Alfred M. Szmidt]

   -    Backshlash handling is completely broken in the gmake makefile parser.
           GNU make is trying to work around the problems caused by the
           proken parser by adding dozens of #ifdef WIN32 constructs.

           A parser that follows the POSIX standard does not need a single
           line od DOS/Win32 specific code.

Concrete example?

   -    Space handling (e.g. escaped newlines) is completely broken in 
           the gmake makefile parser. 

           Use this Makefile:
   FOO=a\ 
   \ 
   \ 
   \ 
   b 

   all: 
           @echo "${FOO}" 

           Test with Sun make, smake (ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/smake/alpha/)
           and gmake:

           \make
           a    b
           smake
           a    b
           gmake
           a b

Care to quote line and verse of POSIX?  I couldn't find where this
must be the behaviour of a POSIX compliant make.  Infact, this is what
IEEE Std 1003.1-2004 (the only thing I had in my posession at this
time, but it should be good enough) says:

f= bar baz\
   biz
a:
        echo ==$f==

           echoes "==bar baz biz=="

>From the looks, smake and whatever `make' is supposed to be are not
following the relevant standards, while GNU Make is.  Maybe you are
refering to something else?  Quote? URL?

   -    GNU make incorrectly expands "$<" for non-inplicit rules.
           It is impossible to expand "$<" to something useful in
           explicit rules. 

Concrete example?

           The fact that GNU make expands it to something strange
           causes many people to write broken Makefiles that depend
           on the GNU make bugs.

What you consider a bug, people consider a feature.  Can you show
where POSIX prohibits this behaviour?

   -    GNU make incorrectly expands "$*" for non-inplicit rules.
           It is impossible to expand "$*" to something useful in
           explicit rules. 

Concrete example?

           The fact that GNU make expands it to something strange
           causes many people to write broken Makefiles that depend
           on the GNU make bugs.

What you consider a bug, people consider a feature.  Can you show
where POSIX prohibits this behaviour?