Subject: Re: bug#13002: Updated, fixed patch

From: Karl Berry <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 29 Oct 2020 19:45:25 -0600

install an acceptable version of my patch, as it improves the status
    quo, and include it in the next release. Then I'd think about
    whether it's possible to redo the Vala support entirely.

Sounds sensible.

I applied your change, but when running make distcheck (not make check) 
the new vala-libs-distcheck.sh test fails. Does that happen for you?

Most of the other vala tests are skipped, with the message:
vala-libs-vpath: skipped test: pkg-config m4 macros not found

I don't see anything especially different in vala-libs-distcheck than
the others. vala-libs-vpath has exactly the same list of required=
programs and it is skipped.

The failure output is:
./configure: line 4032: syntax error near unexpected token `0.22'
./configure: line 4032: `PKG_PROG_PKG_CONFIG(0.22)'
which is expected, but clearly it shouldn't be getting to that point if
it can't find pkg.m4. (I think make distcheck sets up an environment
where any system pkg.m4, among others, will not be found.) I note that
this is the only call to any PKG_ macro other than PKG_CHECK_MODULES,
although I don't see why that should matter.

I'll try to pursue further tomorrow/soon, but thought I'd report now and
see if you get the same ... --thanks, karl.