On Wed, 2024-07-03 at 19:46 +0200, Simon Josefsson via Gnulib
discussion list wrote:
> The reason all this happens is this code in top/maint.mk:
>
> # If RELEASE_TYPE is undefined, but RELEASE is, use its second word.
> # But overwrite VERSION.
> ifdef RELEASE
> VERSION := $(word 1, $(RELEASE))
> RELEASE_TYPE ?= $(word 2, $(RELEASE))
> endif
Personally I find it kind of ... not good to accept values for these
critical variables from the environment in the first place, especially
in a common, unqualified form like that ("RELEASE").
Wouldn't it be better to only allow these to be changed by explicit
assignment on the command line, rather than inherited via the
environment?
Unless the current behavior must be preserved, I would think that
something like:
RELEASE := $(GNULIB_RELEASE)
coming early in the makefile would be good. This (a) ensures we don't
use the generic environment variable RELEASE, (b) allows GNULIB_RELEASE
to be obtained from the environment, and (c) allows RELEASE to be
overridden on the command line.
Just a thought.
