Package: autoconf
Version: 2.60a-1
Severity: important
In recent versions of autoconf (present in unstable for many months now):
$datadir is set to "${datarootdir}" (not expanded)
$datarootdir is set to "${prefix}" (not expanded)
$prefix is set to "NONE"
This is, simply, absurdly obnoxious. In the first place you can never
actually use $datadir. You have to use a macro of some sort that will expand
it twice
datadir=eval $datadir
dataidr=eval $datadir
before you can even make use of the variable. Finally, since no prefix is
set by default you have to set one manually before you can use this.
The end result is that autoconf code that previously gave reasonable behavior
like
AC_DEFINE_UNQOUTED(DATADIR, "$datadir")
is now useless and gives something like
#define DATADIR "${prefix}"
in your config.h.
And not only that, but this affects older software as well. Older versions of
my code that use the above lines will no longer compile in debian.
The only conclusion I can reach is not to use $datadir at all. One should
instead use $prefix directly. Yes, this will mean that the --datadir
argument of configure will no longer work as expected, but the alternative is
simply too tedious. Or maybe I can just use a macro
AC_DEFUN([FIX_DATADIR],
[
if test $prefix = "NONE"; then
prefix="/usr/local"
fi
datadir=eval $datadir
datadir=eval $datadir
])
and add this to every single configure.ac file before $datadir is used.
-- System Information:
Debian Release: testing/unstable
APT prefers unstable
APT policy: (500, 'unstable')
Architecture: i386 (i686)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash
Kernel: Linux 2.6.17-2-686
Locale: LANG=C, LC_CTYPE=C (charmap=ANSI_X3.4-1968)
Versions of packages autoconf depends on:
ii debianutils 2.17 Miscellaneous utilities specific t
ii m4 1.4.6-1 a macro processing language
ii perl 5.8.8-6.1 Larry Wall's Practical Extraction
Versions of packages autoconf recommends:
ii automake1.9 [automaken] 1.9.6-5 A tool for generating GNU Standard
-- no debconf information
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