On 23 Feb 2000, Akim Demaille wrote:
>
> Finally, IMHO, it is not the mission of Autoconf to be a constellation
> of specialized macros (I don't mean you believed it was, I just want
> to state publicly my opinion). The true nature of Autoconf is to
> provide the environment. Major improvements were done so that
> Autoconf is extendable.
Autoconf is both a framework, and a collection of macros. While the
framework is quite valuable, by itself it does not achieve the
objective of improving the quality/portability of free software across
many platforms. Inclusion of a macro in autoconf frees the free
software developer to focus on his/her program rather than portability
of a shell script fragment across many platforms (which may not even
be available to the developer).
Macros which are of value to a significant percentage of software
projects should be included in Autoconf so that the wisdom and efforts
of others may be shared. Likewise, macros which are rarely used
should not be included in Autoconf since they represent a maintenance
burden.
The value of a macro has little to do with whether it is "specialized"
or not. There are many specialized macros which are of value to a
large population of software projects. I suggest that the selection
criteria should be based on how many existing projects/developers find
the macro to be of value.
Bob
======================================
Bob Friesenhahn
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.simplesystems.org/users/bfriesen
