On Monday 29 August 2011, Stefano Lattarini wrote:
> I catched this while working some more on the Automake testsuite:
> 
>  $ cat Makefile.am
>  TEST_EXTENSIONS = .t-1
>  TESTS = foo.t-1
>  $ cat configure.ac
>  AC_INIT([foo], [1.0])
>  AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE([foreign -Wall parallel-tests])
>  AC_CONFIG_FILES([Makefile])
>  AC_OUTPUT
>  $ aclocal
>  $ autoconf
>  $ : > install-sh
>  $ : > missing
>  $ automake
>  automake: bad characters in variable name `T-1_LOG_COMPILE'
>  automake: T-1_LOG_COMPILER: non-POSIX variable name
>  automake: AM_T-1_LOG_FLAGS: non-POSIX variable name
>  automake: T-1_LOG_FLAGS: non-POSIX variable name
> 
> Do you think it would be worthwhile to lift this limitation, by
> automatically transliterating `-' (and maybe other non-alphabetic
> characters) to `_'?  Or should we simply give an error when something
> in $(TEST_EXTENSIONS) contains non-alphabetic characters?
> 
> Regards,
>   Stefano
> 
For the moment, I've decided to take the easiest route, documenting the
limitation and correcting the diagnostic.  Such restriction could easily
be lifted at a later time, with no backward-compatibility issues.

Attached is the patch I'll push in a couple of days if there is no
objection.  As usual, reviews are welcome.

Regards,
  Stefano