Subject: bug#20733: coreutils build problem

From: Eric Blake <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 05 Jun 2015 07:05:50 -0600

On 06/05/2015 04:45 AM, Michael Felt wrote:

[we tend to avoid top-posting on technical lists, as it makes it harder
to follow the flow of the message]

> My "fear" is that autoconf has introduced this "catch-all" as I have been
> running into it more frequently of late (first time was last November when
> I took my first attempt at packaging gcc.)
> 

Paul's patch was specific to a coreutils file.  So far, I have not seen
any evidence of autoconf introducing 'for x in ;' anywhere in configure.
 If you are seeing the same problem in multiple packages, so far it is
because each package has made a similar mistake in their local
configuration files.

> I shall look at the patch and let you know - however, regardless of whether
> it works or not - is this something that autoconf is introducing, read
> changed - requiring you to make a patch. If so, while from autoconf
> perspective all may be well - it is not very user-friendly. (I just do not
> understand autoconf well enough to make that distinction).

If the syntax error is in autoconf.ac or in Makefile.am, then it is the
package that wrote the file at fault.  If the syntax error is not in
anything the package provides, but appears in the generated configure
file, then it is more likely to be in automake or autoconf.

-- 
Eric Blake   eblake redhat com    +1-919-301-3266
Libvirt virtualization library http://libvirt.org