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Autoconf-generated configure
scripts need some information about
how to initialize, such as how to find the package's source files and
about the output files to produce. The following sections describe the
initialization and the creation of output files.
4.1 Initializing configure
Option processing etc. 4.2 Notices in configure
Copyright, version numbers in configure
4.3 Finding configure
InputWhere Autoconf should find files 4.4 Outputting Files Outputting results from the configuration 4.5 Performing Configuration Actions Preparing the output based on results 4.6 Creating Configuration Files Creating output files 4.7 Substitutions in Makefiles Using output variables in `Makefile's 4.8 Configuration Header Files Creating a configuration header file 4.9 Running Arbitrary Configuration Commands Running arbitrary instantiation commands 4.10 Creating Configuration Links Links depending on the configuration 4.11 Configuring Other Packages in Subdirectories Configuring independent packages together 4.12 Default Prefix Changing the default installation prefix
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configure
Every configure
script must call AC_INIT
before doing
anything else. The only other required macro is AC_OUTPUT
(see section 4.4 Outputting Files).
Set the name of the package and its version. These are
typically used in `--version' support, including that of
configure
. The optional argument bug-report should be
the email to which users should send bug reports. The package
tarname differs from package: the latter designates the full
package name (e.g., `GNU Autoconf'), while the former is meant for
distribution tar ball names (e.g., `autoconf'). It defaults to
package with `GNU ' stripped, lower-cased, and all characters
other than alphanumerics and underscores are changed to `-'.
It is preferable that the arguments of AC_INIT
be static, i.e.,
there should not be any shell computation, but they can be computed by
M4.
The following M4 macros (e.g., AC_PACKAGE_NAME
), output variables
(e.g., PACKAGE_NAME
), and preprocessor symbols (e.g.,
PACKAGE_NAME
) are defined by AC_INIT
:
AC_PACKAGE_NAME
, PACKAGE_NAME
AC_PACKAGE_TARNAME
, PACKAGE_TARNAME
AC_PACKAGE_VERSION
, PACKAGE_VERSION
AC_PACKAGE_STRING
, PACKAGE_STRING
AC_PACKAGE_BUGREPORT
, PACKAGE_BUGREPORT
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configure
The following macros manage version numbers for configure
scripts. Using them is optional.
configure
is earlier
than version, print an error message to the standard error output
and do not create configure
. For example:
AC_PREREQ(2.57) |
This macro is the only macro that may be used before AC_INIT
, but
for consistency, you are invited not to do so.
configure
are covered by the
copyright-notice.
The copyright-notice will show up in both the head of
configure
and in `configure --version'.
configure
script, with any dollar signs or double-quotes removed. This macro lets
you put a revision stamp from `configure.ac' into configure
without RCS or CVS changing it when you check in
configure
. That way, you can determine easily which revision of
`configure.ac' a particular configure
corresponds to.
For example, this line in `configure.ac':
AC_REVISION($Revision: 1.30 $) |
produces this in configure
:
#! /bin/sh # From configure.ac Revision: 1.30 |
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configure
Input configure
checks for this file's existence to
make sure that the directory that it is told contains the source code in
fact does. Occasionally people accidentally specify the wrong directory
with `--srcdir'; this is a safety check. See section 13.9 configure
Invocation, for more information.
Packages that do manual configuration or use the install
program
might need to tell configure
where to find some other shell
scripts by calling AC_CONFIG_AUX_DIR
, though the default places
it looks are correct for most cases.
configure
,
Automake and Libtool scripts etc.) that are in directory dir.
These are auxiliary files used in configuration. dir can be
either absolute or relative to `srcdir'. The default is
`srcdir' or `srcdir/..' or
`srcdir/../..', whichever is the first that contains
`install-sh'. The other files are not checked for, so that using
AC_PROG_INSTALL
does not automatically require distributing the
other auxiliary files. It checks for `install.sh' also, but that
name is obsolete because some make
have a rule that creates
`install' from it if there is no `Makefile'.
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Every Autoconf script, e.g., `configure.ac', should finish by
calling AC_OUTPUT
. That is the macro that generates
`config.status', which will create the `Makefile's and any
other files resulting from configuration. This is the only required
macro besides AC_INIT
(see section 4.3 Finding configure
Input).
`config.status' will perform all the configuration actions: all the
output files (see 4.6 Creating Configuration Files, macro
AC_CONFIG_FILES
), header files (see 4.8 Configuration Header Files,
macro AC_CONFIG_HEADERS
), commands (see 4.9 Running Arbitrary Configuration Commands, macro AC_CONFIG_COMMANDS
), links (see
4.10 Creating Configuration Links, macro AC_CONFIG_LINKS
), subdirectories
to configure (see 4.11 Configuring Other Packages in Subdirectories, macro AC_CONFIG_SUBDIRS
)
are honored.
Historically, the usage of AC_OUTPUT
was somewhat different.
See section 15.4 Obsolete Macros, for a description of the arguments that
AC_OUTPUT
used to support.
If you run make
in subdirectories, you should run it using the
make
variable MAKE
. Most versions of make
set
MAKE
to the name of the make
program plus any options it
was given. (But many do not include in it the values of any variables
set on the command line, so those are not passed on automatically.)
Some old versions of make
do not set this variable. The
following macro allows you to use it even with those versions.
make
predefines the Make variable MAKE
, define
output variable SET_MAKE
to be empty. Otherwise, define
SET_MAKE
to contain `MAKE=make'. Calls AC_SUBST
for
SET_MAKE
.
If you use this macro, place a line like this in each `Makefile.in'
that runs MAKE
on other directories:
@SET_MAKE@ |
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`configure' is designed so that it appears to do everything itself, but there is actually a hidden slave: `config.status'. `configure' is in charge of examining your system, but it is `config.status' that actually takes the proper actions based on the results of `configure'. The most typical task of `config.status' is to instantiate files.
This section describes the common behavior of the four standard
instantiating macros: AC_CONFIG_FILES
, AC_CONFIG_HEADERS
,
AC_CONFIG_COMMANDS
and AC_CONFIG_LINKS
. They all
have this prototype:
AC_CONFIG_FOOS(tag..., [commands], [init-cmds]) |
where the arguments are:
You are encouraged to use literals as tags. In particular, you should avoid
... && my_foos="$my_foos fooo" ... && my_foos="$my_foos foooo" AC_CONFIG_FOOS($my_foos) |
and use this instead:
... && AC_CONFIG_FOOS(fooo) ... && AC_CONFIG_FOOS(foooo) |
The macros AC_CONFIG_FILES
and AC_CONFIG_HEADERS
use
special tags: they may have the form `output' or
`output:inputs'. The file output is instantiated
from its templates, inputs (defaulting to `output.in').
For instance `AC_CONFIG_FILES(Makefile:boiler/top.mk:boiler/bot.mk)' asks for the creation of `Makefile' that will be the expansion of the output variables in the concatenation of `boiler/top.mk' and `boiler/bot.mk'.
The special value `-' might be used to denote the standard output when used in output, or the standard input when used in the inputs. You most probably don't need to use this in `configure.ac', but it is convenient when using the command line interface of `./config.status', see 14. Recreating a Configuration, for more details.
The inputs may be absolute or relative filenames. In the latter case they are first looked for in the build tree, and then in the source tree.
The variables set during the execution of configure
are
not available here: you first need to set them via the
init-cmds. Nonetheless the following variables are precomputed:
srcdir
configure
's option `--srcdir' sets.
ac_top_srcdir
ac_top_builddir
ac_srcdir
The current directory refers to the directory (or pseudo-directory) containing the input part of tags. For instance, running
AC_CONFIG_COMMANDS([deep/dir/out:in/in.in], [...], [...]) |
with `--srcdir=../package' produces the following values:
# Argument of --srcdir srcdir='../package' # Reversing deep/dir ac_top_builddir='../../' # Concatenation of $ac_top_builddir and srcdir ac_top_srcdir='../../../package' # Concatenation of $ac_top_srcdir and deep/dir ac_srcdir='../../../package/deep/dir' |
independently of `in/in.in'.
var
. init-cmds
is typically used by `configure' to give `config.status' some
variables it needs to run the commands.
You should be extremely cautious in your variable names: all the init-cmds share the same name space and may overwrite each other in unpredictable ways. Sorry....
All these macros can be called multiple times, with different tags, of course!
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Be sure to read the previous section, 4.5 Performing Configuration Actions.
AC_OUTPUT
create each `file' by copying an input
file (by default `file.in'), substituting the output variable
values.
This macro is one of the instantiating macros; see 4.5 Performing Configuration Actions. See section 4.7 Substitutions in Makefiles, for more information on using
output variables. See section 7.2 Setting Output Variables, for more information
on creating them. This macro creates the directory that the file is in
if it doesn't exist. Usually, `Makefile's are created this way,
but other files, such as `.gdbinit', can be specified as well.
Typical calls to AC_CONFIG_FILES
look like this:
AC_CONFIG_FILES([Makefile src/Makefile man/Makefile X/Imakefile]) AC_CONFIG_FILES([autoconf], [chmod +x autoconf]) |
You can override an input file name by appending to file a colon-separated list of input files. Examples:
AC_CONFIG_FILES([Makefile:boiler/top.mk:boiler/bot.mk] [lib/Makefile:boiler/lib.mk]) |
Doing this allows you to keep your file names acceptable to MS-DOS, or to prepend and/or append boilerplate to the file.
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Each subdirectory in a distribution that contains something to be
compiled or installed should come with a file `Makefile.in', from
which configure
will create a `Makefile' in that directory.
To create a `Makefile', configure
performs a simple variable
substitution, replacing occurrences of `@variable@' in
`Makefile.in' with the value that configure
has determined
for that variable. Variables that are substituted into output files in
this way are called output variables. They are ordinary shell
variables that are set in configure
. To make configure
substitute a particular variable into the output files, the macro
AC_SUBST
must be called with that variable name as an argument.
Any occurrences of `@variable@' for other variables are
left unchanged. See section 7.2 Setting Output Variables, for more information
on creating output variables with AC_SUBST
.
A software package that uses a configure
script should be
distributed with a file `Makefile.in', but no `Makefile'; that
way, the user has to properly configure the package for the local system
before compiling it.
See section `Makefile Conventions' in The GNU Coding Standards, for more information on what to put in `Makefile's.
4.7.1 Preset Output Variables Output variables that are always set 4.7.2 Installation Directory Variables Other preset output variables 4.7.3 Build Directories Supporting multiple concurrent compiles 4.7.4 Automatic Remaking Makefile rules for configuring
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Some output variables are preset by the Autoconf macros. Some of the
Autoconf macros set additional output variables, which are mentioned in
the descriptions for those macros. See section B.2 Output Variable Index, for a
complete list of output variables. See section 4.7.2 Installation Directory Variables, for the list of the preset ones related to installation
directories. Below are listed the other preset ones. They all are
precious variables (see section 7.2 Setting Output Variables,
AC_ARG_VAR
).
configure
runs, the default value is set
when you call AC_PROG_CC
(or empty if you don't). configure
uses this variable when compiling programs to test for C features.
configure
and giving the name of the input file.
AC_OUTPUT
adds a comment line containing this variable to the top
of every `Makefile' it creates. For other files, you should
reference this variable in a comment at the top of each input file. For
example, an input shell script should begin like this:
#! /bin/sh # @configure_input@ |
The presence of that line also reminds people editing the file that it
needs to be processed by configure
in order to be used.
configure
runs, the default
value is empty. configure
uses this variable when compiling or
preprocessing programs to test for C and C++ features.
configure
runs, the default value is
set when you call AC_PROG_CXX
(or empty if you don't).
configure
uses this variable when compiling programs to test for
C++ features.
AC_CONFIG_HEADERS
is called, configure
replaces `@DEFS@' with
`-DHAVE_CONFIG_H' instead (see section 4.8 Configuration Header Files). This
variable is not defined while configure
is performing its tests,
only when creating the output files. See section 7.2 Setting Output Variables, for
how to check the results of previous tests.
echo
for
question-answer message pairs? These variables provide a way:
echo $ECHO_N "And the winner is... $ECHO_C" sleep 100000000000 echo "${ECHO_T}dead." |
Some old and uncommon echo
implementations offer no means to
achieve this, in which case ECHO_T
is set to tab. You might not
want to use it.
configure
runs, the default
value is set when you call AC_PROG_F77
(or empty if you don't).
configure
uses this variable when compiling programs to test for
Fortran 77 features.
LIBS
instead. If it is not set
in the environment when configure
runs, the default value is empty.
configure
uses this variable when linking programs to test for
C, C++ and Fortran 77 features.
configure
uses this variable when linking
programs to test for C, C++ and Fortran 77 features.
builddir
.
builddir
.
top_builddir
.
srcdir
.
srcdir
.
top_srcdir
.
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The following variables specify the directories where the package will be installed, see section `Variables for Installation Directories' in The GNU Coding Standards, for more information. See the end of this section for details on when and how to use these variables.
Most of these variables have values that rely on prefix
or
exec_prefix
. It is deliberate that the directory output
variables keep them unexpanded: typically `@datadir@' will be
replaced by `${prefix}/share', not `/usr/local/share'.
This behavior is mandated by the GNU coding standards, so that when the user runs:
configure
, in which case, if needed, the package shall hard
code dependencies corresponding to the make-specified prefix.
In order to support these features, it is essential that datadir
remains being defined as `${prefix}/share' to depend upon the
current value of prefix
.
A corollary is that you should not use these variables except in
Makefiles. For instance, instead of trying to evaluate datadir
in `configure' and hard-coding it in Makefiles using
e.g., `AC_DEFINE_UNQUOTED(DATADIR, "$datadir")', you should add
`-DDATADIR="$(datadir)"' to your CPPFLAGS
.
Similarly you should not rely on AC_OUTPUT_FILES
to replace
datadir
and friends in your shell scripts and other files, rather
let make
manage their replacement. For instance Autoconf
ships templates of its shell scripts ending with `.in', and uses a
Makefile snippet similar to:
edit = sed \ -e 's,@datadir\@,$(pkgdatadir),g' \ -e 's,@prefix\@,$(prefix),g' autoconf: Makefile $(srcdir)/autoconf.in rm -f autoconf autoconf.tmp $(edit) $(srcdir)/autoconf.in >autoconf.tmp chmod +x autoconf.tmp mv autoconf.tmp autoconf autoheader: Makefile $(srcdir)/autoheader.in rm -f autoheader autoheader.tmp $(edit) $(srcdir)/autoconf.in >autoheader.tmp chmod +x autoheader.tmp mv autoheader.tmp autoheader |
Some details are noteworthy:
configure
from replacing
`@datadir@' in the sed expression itself.
edit
uses values that depend on the configuration specific
values (prefix
etc.) and not only on VERSION
and so forth,
the output depends on `Makefile', not `configure.ac'.
autoconf autoheader: Makefile .in: rm -f $@ $@.tmp $(edit) $< >$@.tmp chmod +x $@.tmp mv $@.tmp $@ |
See section 10.10 Limitations of Make, for details.
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You can support compiling a software package for several architectures simultaneously from the same copy of the source code. The object files for each architecture are kept in their own directory.
To support doing this, make
uses the VPATH
variable to
find the files that are in the source directory. GNU Make
and most other recent make
programs can do this. Older
make
programs do not support VPATH
; when using them, the
source code must be in the same directory as the object files.
To support VPATH
, each `Makefile.in' should contain two
lines that look like:
srcdir = @srcdir@ VPATH = @srcdir@ |
Do not set VPATH
to the value of another variable, for example
`VPATH = $(srcdir)', because some versions of make
do not do
variable substitutions on the value of VPATH
.
configure
substitutes the correct value for srcdir
when
it produces `Makefile'.
Do not use the make
variable $<
, which expands to the
file name of the file in the source directory (found with VPATH
),
except in implicit rules. (An implicit rule is one such as `.c.o',
which tells how to create a `.o' file from a `.c' file.) Some
versions of make
do not set $<
in explicit rules; they
expand it to an empty value.
Instead, `Makefile' command lines should always refer to source files by prefixing them with `$(srcdir)/'. For example:
time.info: time.texinfo $(MAKEINFO) $(srcdir)/time.texinfo |
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You can put rules like the following in the top-level `Makefile.in' for a package to automatically update the configuration information when you change the configuration files. This example includes all of the optional files, such as `aclocal.m4' and those related to configuration header files. Omit from the `Makefile.in' rules for any of these files that your package does not use.
The `$(srcdir)/' prefix is included because of limitations in the
VPATH
mechanism.
The `stamp-' files are necessary because the timestamps of
`config.h.in' and `config.h' will not be changed if remaking
them does not change their contents. This feature avoids unnecessary
recompilation. You should include the file `stamp-h.in' your
package's distribution, so make
will consider
`config.h.in' up to date. Don't use touch
(see section 10.9 Limitations of Usual Tools), rather use echo
(using
date
would cause needless differences, hence CVS
conflicts etc.).
$(srcdir)/configure: configure.ac aclocal.m4 cd $(srcdir) && autoconf # autoheader might not change config.h.in, so touch a stamp file. $(srcdir)/config.h.in: stamp-h.in $(srcdir)/stamp-h.in: configure.ac aclocal.m4 cd $(srcdir) && autoheader echo timestamp > $(srcdir)/stamp-h.in config.h: stamp-h stamp-h: config.h.in config.status ./config.status Makefile: Makefile.in config.status ./config.status config.status: configure ./config.status --recheck |
(Be careful if you copy these lines directly into your Makefile, as you will need to convert the indented lines to start with the tab character.)
In addition, you should use `AC_CONFIG_FILES([stamp-h], [echo
timestamp > stamp-h])' so `config.status' will ensure that
`config.h' is considered up to date. See section 4.4 Outputting Files, for more
information about AC_OUTPUT
.
See section 14. Recreating a Configuration, for more examples of handling configuration-related dependencies.
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When a package contains more than a few tests that define C preprocessor
symbols, the command lines to pass `-D' options to the compiler
can get quite long. This causes two problems. One is that the
make
output is hard to visually scan for errors. More
seriously, the command lines can exceed the length limits of some
operating systems. As an alternative to passing `-D' options to
the compiler, configure
scripts can create a C header file
containing `#define' directives. The AC_CONFIG_HEADERS
macro selects this kind of output. It should be called right after
AC_INIT
.
The package should `#include' the configuration header file before
any other header files, to prevent inconsistencies in declarations (for
example, if it redefines const
). Use `#include <config.h>'
instead of `#include "config.h"', and pass the C compiler a
`-I.' option (or `-I..'; whichever directory contains
`config.h'). That way, even if the source directory is configured
itself (perhaps to make a distribution), other build directories can
also be configured without finding the `config.h' from the source
directory.
AC_OUTPUT
create the file(s) in the
whitespace-separated list header containing C preprocessor
#define
statements, and replace `@DEFS@' in generated
files with `-DHAVE_CONFIG_H' instead of the value of DEFS
.
The usual name for header is `config.h'.
If header already exists and its contents are identical to what
AC_OUTPUT
would put in it, it is left alone. Doing this allows
making some changes in the configuration without needlessly causing
object files that depend on the header file to be recompiled.
Usually the input file is named `header.in'; however, you can override the input file name by appending to header a colon-separated list of input files. Examples:
AC_CONFIG_HEADERS([config.h:config.hin]) AC_CONFIG_HEADERS([defines.h:defs.pre:defines.h.in:defs.post]) |
Doing this allows you to keep your file names acceptable to MS-DOS, or to prepend and/or append boilerplate to the file.
See section 4.5 Performing Configuration Actions, for more details on header.
4.8.1 Configuration Header Templates Input for the configuration headers 4.8.2 Using autoheader
to Create `config.h.in'How to create configuration templates 4.8.3 Autoheader Macros How to specify CPP templates
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Your distribution should contain a template file that looks as you want
the final header file to look, including comments, with #undef
statements which are used as hooks. For example, suppose your
`configure.ac' makes these calls:
AC_CONFIG_HEADERS([conf.h]) AC_CHECK_HEADERS([unistd.h]) |
Then you could have code like the following in `conf.h.in'. On
systems that have `unistd.h', configure
will `#define'
`HAVE_UNISTD_H' to 1. On other systems, the whole line will be
commented out (in case the system predefines that symbol).
/* Define as 1 if you have unistd.h. */ #undef HAVE_UNISTD_H |
Pay attention that `#undef' is in the first column, and there is nothing behind `HAVE_UNISTD_H', not even white spaces. You can then decode the configuration header using the preprocessor directives:
#include <conf.h> #if HAVE_UNISTD_H # include <unistd.h> #else /* We are in trouble. */ #endif |
The use of old form templates, with `#define' instead of `#undef' is strongly discouraged. Similarly with old templates with comments on the same line as the `#undef'. Anyway, putting comments in preprocessor macros has never been a good idea.
Since it is a tedious task to keep a template header up to date, you may
use autoheader
to generate it, see 4.8.2 Using autoheader
to Create `config.h.in'.
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autoheader
to Create `config.h.in'
The autoheader
program can create a template file of C
`#define' statements for configure
to use. If
`configure.ac' invokes AC_CONFIG_HEADERS(file)
,
autoheader
creates `file.in'; if multiple file
arguments are given, the first one is used. Otherwise,
autoheader
creates `config.h.in'.
In order to do its job, autoheader
needs you to document all
of the symbols that you might use; i.e., there must be at least one
AC_DEFINE
or one AC_DEFINE_UNQUOTED
call with a third
argument for each symbol (see section 7.1 Defining C Preprocessor Symbols). An additional
constraint is that the first argument of AC_DEFINE
must be a
literal. Note that all symbols defined by Autoconf's builtin tests are
already documented properly; you only need to document those that you
define yourself.
You might wonder why autoheader
is needed: after all, why
would configure
need to "patch" a `config.h.in' to
produce a `config.h' instead of just creating `config.h' from
scratch? Well, when everything rocks, the answer is just that we are
wasting our time maintaining autoheader
: generating
`config.h' directly is all that is needed. When things go wrong,
however, you'll be thankful for the existence of autoheader
.
The fact that the symbols are documented is important in order to
check that `config.h' makes sense. The fact that there is a
well-defined list of symbols that should be #define
'd (or not) is
also important for people who are porting packages to environments where
configure
cannot be run: they just have to fill in the
blanks.
But let's come back to the point: autoheader
's invocation...
If you give autoheader
an argument, it uses that file instead
of `configure.ac' and writes the header file to the standard output
instead of to `config.h.in'. If you give autoheader
an
argument of `-', it reads the standard input instead of
`configure.ac' and writes the header file to the standard output.
autoheader
accepts the following options:
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autoheader
scans `configure.ac' and figures out which C
preprocessor symbols it might define. It knows how to generate
templates for symbols defined by AC_CHECK_HEADERS
,
AC_CHECK_FUNCS
etc., but if you AC_DEFINE
any additional
symbol, you must define a template for it. If there are missing
templates, autoheader
fails with an error message.
The simplest way to create a template for a symbol is to supply the description argument to an `AC_DEFINE(symbol)'; see 7.1 Defining C Preprocessor Symbols. You may also use one of the following macros.
autoheader
to include the template as-is in the header
template file. This template is associated with the key,
which is used to sort all the different templates and guarantee their
uniqueness. It should be a symbol that can be AC_DEFINE
'd.
For example:
AH_VERBATIM([_GNU_SOURCE], [/* Enable GNU extensions on systems that have them. */ #ifndef _GNU_SOURCE # define _GNU_SOURCE #endif]) |
autoheader
to generate a template for key. This macro
generates standard templates just like AC_DEFINE
when a
description is given.
For example:
AH_TEMPLATE([CRAY_STACKSEG_END], [Define to one of _getb67, GETB67, getb67 for Cray-2 and Cray-YMP systems. This function is required for alloca.c support on those systems.]) |
will generate the following template, with the description properly justified.
/* Define to one of _getb67, GETB67, getb67 for Cray-2 and Cray-YMP systems. This function is required for alloca.c support on those systems. */ #undef CRAY_STACKSEG_END |
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You can execute arbitrary commands before, during, and after
`config.status' is run. The three following macros accumulate the
commands to run when they are called multiple times.
AC_CONFIG_COMMANDS
replaces the obsolete macro
AC_OUTPUT_COMMANDS
; see 15.4 Obsolete Macros, for details.
configure
. Associate the commands with tag. Since
typically the cmds create a file, tag should naturally be
the name of that file. This macro is one of the instantiating macros;
see 4.5 Performing Configuration Actions.
Here is an unrealistic example:
fubar=42 AC_CONFIG_COMMANDS([fubar], [echo this is extra $fubar, and so on.], [fubar=$fubar]) |
Here is a better one:
AC_CONFIG_COMMANDS([time-stamp], [date >time-stamp]) |
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You may find it convenient to create links whose destinations depend upon
results of tests. One can use AC_CONFIG_COMMANDS
but the
creation of relative symbolic links can be delicate when the package is
built in a directory different from the source directory.
AC_OUTPUT
link each of the existing files source to
the corresponding link name dest. Makes a symbolic link if
possible, otherwise a hard link if possible, otherwise a copy. The
dest and source names should be relative to the top level
source or build directory. This macro is one of the instantiating
macros; see 4.5 Performing Configuration Actions.
For example, this call:
AC_CONFIG_LINKS(host.h:config/$machine.h object.h:config/$obj_format.h) |
creates in the current directory `host.h' as a link to `srcdir/config/$machine.h', and `object.h' as a link to `srcdir/config/$obj_format.h'.
The tempting value `.' for dest is invalid: it makes it impossible for `config.status' to guess the links to establish.
One can then run:
./config.status host.h object.h |
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In most situations, calling AC_OUTPUT
is sufficient to produce
`Makefile's in subdirectories. However, configure
scripts
that control more than one independent package can use
AC_CONFIG_SUBDIRS
to run configure
scripts for other
packages in subdirectories.
AC_OUTPUT
run configure
in each subdirectory
dir in the given whitespace-separated list. Each dir should
be a literal, i.e., please do not use:
if test "$package_foo_enabled" = yes; then $my_subdirs="$my_subdirs foo" fi AC_CONFIG_SUBDIRS($my_subdirs) |
because this prevents `./configure --help=recursive' from
displaying the options of the package foo
. Rather, you should
write:
if test "$package_foo_enabled" = yes; then AC_CONFIG_SUBDIRS(foo) fi |
If a given dir is not found, an error is reported: if the subdirectory is optional, write:
if test -d $srcdir/foo; then AC_CONFIG_SUBDIRS(foo) fi |
If a given dir contains configure.gnu
, it is run instead
of configure
. This is for packages that might use a
non-Autoconf script Configure
, which can't be called through a
wrapper configure
since it would be the same file on
case-insensitive filesystems. Likewise, if a dir contains
`configure.in' but no configure
, the Cygnus
configure
script found by AC_CONFIG_AUX_DIR
is used.
The subdirectory configure
scripts are given the same command
line options that were given to this configure
script, with minor
changes if needed, which include:
$prefix
, including if it was
defaulted, and if the default values of the top level and of the subdirectory
`configure' differ.
This macro also sets the output variable subdirs
to the list of
directories `dir ...'. `Makefile' rules can use
this variable to determine which subdirectories to recurse into.
This macro may be called multiple times.
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By default, configure
sets the prefix for files it installs to
`/usr/local'. The user of configure
can select a different
prefix using the `--prefix' and `--exec-prefix' options.
There are two ways to change the default: when creating
configure
, and when running it.
Some software packages might want to install in a directory other than
`/usr/local' by default. To accomplish that, use the
AC_PREFIX_DEFAULT
macro.
It may be convenient for users to have configure
guess the
installation prefix from the location of a related program that they
have already installed. If you wish to do that, you can call
AC_PREFIX_PROGRAM
.
PATH
, the way the shell does. If program
is found, set the prefix to the parent of the directory containing
program, else default the prefix as described above
(`/usr/local' or AC_PREFIX_DEFAULT
). For example, if
program is gcc
and the PATH
contains
`/usr/local/gnu/bin/gcc', set the prefix to `/usr/local/gnu'.
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