3 * WARNING: Future backward-incompatibilities!
5 - Automake 1.14 will require Autoconf 2.70 or later (which is still
6 unreleased at the moment of writing, but is planned to be released
7 before Automake 1.14 is).
9 - Automake 1.14 will drop support for the long-deprecated 'configure.in'
10 name for the Autoconf input file. You are advised to start using the
11 recommended name 'configure.ac' instead, ASAP.
13 - The ACLOCAL_AMFLAGS special make variable will be fully deprecated
14 in Automake 1.14 (where it will raise warnings in the "obsolete"
15 category). You are advised to start relying on the new Automake
16 support for AC_CONFIG_MACRO_DIRS instead (which was introduced in
19 - Automake 1.14 will remove support for automatic dependency tracking
20 with the SGI C/C++ compilers on IRIX. The SGI depmode has been
21 reported broken "in the wild" already, and we don't think investing
22 time in debugging and fixing is worthwhile, especially considering
23 that SGI has last updated those compilers in 2006, and is expected
24 to retire support for them in December 2013:
25 <http://www.sgi.com/services/support/irix_mips_support.html>
27 - Future versions of Automake might remove support for MS-DOS and
28 Windows 95/98/ME (support for them was offered by relying on the
29 DJGPP project). Note however that both Cygwin and MSYS/MinGW on
30 modern Windows versions will continue to be fully supported.
32 - Automake-provided scripts and makefile recipes might (finally!)
33 start assuming a POSIX shell in Automake 1.14.
35 - Starting from Automake 1.14, third-party m4 files located in the
36 system-wide aclocal directory, as well as in any directory listed
37 in the ACLOCAL_PATH environment variable, will take precedence
38 over "built-in" Automake macros. For example (assuming Automake
39 is installed in the /usr/local hierarchy), a definition of the
40 AM_PROG_VALAC macro found in '/usr/local/share/aclocal/my-vala.m4'
41 should take precedence over the same-named automake-provided macro
42 (defined in '/usr/local/share/aclocal-1.14/vala.m4').
44 * C compilation, and the AC_PROG_CC and AM_PROG_CC_C_O macros:
46 - The 'compile' script is now unconditionally required for all
47 packages that perform C compilation (note that if you are using
48 the '--add-missing' option, automake will fetch that script for
49 you, so you shouldn't need any explicit adjustment).
50 This new behaviour is needed to avoid obscure errors when the
51 'subdir-objects' option is used, and the compiler is an inferior
52 one that doesn't grasp the combined use of both the "-c -o"
53 options; see discussion about automake bug#13378 for more details:
54 <http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=13378#35>
55 <http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=13378#44>
57 - Automake will automatically enhance the AC_PROG_CC autoconf macro
58 to make it check, at configure time, that the C compiler supports
59 the combined use of both the "-c -o" options. This "rewrite" of
60 AC_PROG_CC is only meant to be temporary, since future Autoconf
61 versions should provide all the features Automake needs.
63 - The AM_PROG_CC_C_O is no longer useful, and its use is a no-op
64 now. Future Automake versions might start warning that this
65 macro is obsolete. For better backward-compatibility, this macro
66 still sets a proper 'ac_cv_prog_cc_*_c_o' cache variable, and
67 define the 'NO_MINUS_C_MINUS_O' C preprocessor symbol, but you
68 should really stop relying on that.
72 - Automake can now be instructed to place '.info' files generated from
73 Texinfo input in the builddir rather than in the srcdir; this is done
74 specifying the new automake option 'info-in-builddir'. This feature
75 was requested by the developers of GCC, GDB, GNU binutils and the GNU
76 bfd library. See the extensive discussion about automake bug#11034
79 - For quite a long time, Automake has been implementing an undocumented
80 hack which ensured that '.info' files which appeared to be cleaned
81 (by e.g. being listed in the CLEANFILES or DISTCLEANFILES variables)
82 were built in the builddir rather than in the srcdir; this hack was
83 introduced to ensure better backward-compatibility with packages such
84 as Texinfo, which did things like:
86 info_TEXINFOS = texinfo.txi info-stnd.texi info.texi
87 DISTCLEANFILES = texinfo texinfo-* info*.info*
88 # Do not create info files for distribution.
92 in order not to distribute generated '.info' files.
94 Now that we have the 'info-in-builddir' option that explicitly causes
95 generated '.info' files to be placed in the builddir, this hack should
96 be longer necessary, so we deprecate it with runtime warnings. It will
97 likely be removed altogether in Automake 1.14.
99 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
103 * Documentation fixes:
105 - The long-deprecated but still supported two-arguments invocation form
106 of AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE is documented once again. This seems the sanest
107 thing to do, given that support for such an usage might need to remain
108 in place for a unspecified amount of time in order to cater for people
109 who want to define the version number for their package dynamically at
110 configure runtime (unfortunately, Autoconf does not yet support this
111 scenario, so we cannot delegate the work to it).
113 - The serial testsuite harness is no longer reported as "deprecated",
114 but as "discouraged". We have no plan to remove it, not to make its
115 use cause runtime warnings.
117 - The parallel testsuite is no longer reported as "experimental"; it
118 is well tested, and should be stable now.
120 - The 'shar' and 'tarZ' distribution formats and the 'dist-shar' and
121 'dist-tarZ' options are obsolescent, and their use is deprecated
122 in the documentation.
124 - Other minor miscellaneous fixes and improvements; in particular,
125 some improvements in cross-references.
127 * Obsolescent features:
129 - Use of suffix-less info files (that can be specified through the
130 '@setfilename' macro in Texinfo input files) is discouraged, and
131 its use will raise warnings in the 'obsolete' category. Simply
132 use the '.info' extension for all your info files, transforming
135 @setfilename myprogram
139 @setfilename myprogram.info
141 - Use of Texinfo input files with '.txi' or '.texinfo' extensions
142 is discouraged, and its use will raise warnings in the 'obsolete'
143 category. You are advised to simply use the '.texi' extension
148 - The obsolete macros AM_CONFIG_HEADER or AM_PROG_CC_STDC work once
149 again, as they did in Automake 1.12.x (albeit printing runtime
150 warnings in the 'obsolete' category). Removing them has turned
151 out to be a very bad idea, because it complicated distro packing
152 enormously. Making them issue fatal warnings, as we did in
153 Automake 1.13, has turned out to be a similarly very bad idea,
154 for exactly the same reason.
156 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
162 - Use of the obsolete macros AM_CONFIG_HEADER or AM_PROG_CC_STDC now
163 causes a clear and helpful error message, instead of obscure ones
164 (issue introduced in Automake 1.13).
166 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
172 - ylwrap renames properly header guards in generated header files
173 (*.h), instead of leaving Y_TAB_H.
175 - ylwrap now also converts header guards in implementation files
176 (*.c). Because ylwrap failed to rename properly #include in the
177 implementation files, current versions of Bison (e.g., 2.7)
178 duplicate the generated header file in the implementation file.
179 The header guard then protects the implementation file from
180 duplicate definitions from the header file.
182 * Version requirements:
184 - Autoconf 2.65 or greater is now required.
186 - The rules to build PDF and DVI output from Texinfo input now
187 require Texinfo 4.9 or later.
191 - Support for the "Cygnus-style" trees (once enabled by the 'cygnus'
192 option) has been removed. See discussion about automake bug#11034
193 for more background: <http://debbugs.gnu.org/11034>.
195 - The deprecated aclocal option '--acdir' has been removed. You
196 should use the options '--automake-acdir' and '--system-acdir'
197 instead (which have been introduced in Automake 1.11.2).
199 - The following long-obsolete m4 macros have been removed:
201 AM_PROG_CC_STDC: superseded by AC_PROG_CC since October 2002
202 fp_PROG_CC_STDC: broken alias for AM_PROG_CC_STDC
203 fp_WITH_DMALLOC: old alias for AM_WITH_DMALLOC
204 AM_CONFIG_HEADER: superseded by AC_CONFIG_HEADERS since July 2002
205 ud_PATH_LISPDIR: old alias for AM_PATH_LISPDIR
206 jm_MAINTAINER_MODE: old alias for AM_MAINTAINER_MODE
207 ud_GNU_GETTEXT: old alias for AM_GNU_GETTEXT
208 gm_PROG_LIBTOOL: old alias for AC_PROG_LIBTOOL
209 fp_C_PROTOTYPES: old alias for AM_C_PROTOTYPES (which was part
210 of the now-removed automatic de-ANSI-fication
213 - All the "old alias" macros in 'm4/obsolete.m4' have been removed.
215 - Use of the long-deprecated two- and three-arguments invocation forms
216 of the AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE is no longer documented. It's still supported
217 though (albeit with a warning in the 'obsolete' category), to cater
218 for people who want to define the version number for their package
219 dynamically (e.g., from the current VCS revision). We'll have to
220 continue this support until Autoconf itself is fixed to allow better
221 support for such dynamic version numbers.
223 * Elisp byte-compilation:
225 - The byte compilation of '.el' files into '.elc' files is now done
226 with a suffix rule. This has simplified the compilation process, and
227 more importantly made it less brittle. The downside is that emacs is
228 now invoked once for each '.el' files, which cause some noticeable
229 slowdowns. These should however be mitigated on multicore machines
230 (which are becoming the norm today) if concurrent make ("make -j")
233 - Elisp files placed in a subdirectory are now byte-compiled to '.elc'
234 files in the same subdirectory; for example, byte-compiling of file
235 'sub/foo.el' file will result in 'sub/foo.elc' rather than in
236 'foo.elc'. This behaviour is backward-incompatible with older
237 Automake versions, but it is more natural and more sane. See also
240 - The Emacs invocation performing byte-compilation of '.el' files honors
241 the $(AM_ELCFLAGS) and $(ELCFLAGS) variables; as typical, the former
242 one is developer-reserved and the latter one user-reserved.
244 - The 'elisp-comp' script, once provided by Automake, has been rendered
245 obsoleted by the just-described changes, and thus removed.
247 * Changes to Automake-generated testsuite harnesses:
249 - The parallel testsuite harness (previously only enabled by the
250 'parallel-tests' option) is the default one; the older serial
251 testsuite harness will still be available through the use of the
252 'serial-tests' option (introduced in Automake 1.12).
254 - The 'color-tests' option is now unconditionally activated by default.
255 In particular, this means that testsuite output is now colorized by
256 default if the attached terminal seems to support ANSI escapes, and
257 that the user can force output colorization by setting the variable
258 AM_COLOR_TESTS to "always". The 'color-tests' is still recognized
259 for backward-compatibility, although it's a handled as a no-op now.
261 * Silent rules support:
263 - Support for silent rules is now always active in Automake-generated
264 Makefiles. So, although the verbose output is still the default,
265 the user can now always use "./configure --enable-silent-rules" or
266 "make V=0" to enable quieter output in the package he's building.
268 - The 'silent-rules' option has now become a no-op, preserved for
269 backward-compatibility only. In particular, its use no longer
270 disables the warnings in the 'portability-recursive' category.
274 - The rules to build PDF and DVI files from Texinfo input now require
275 Texinfo 4.9 or later.
277 - The rules to build PDF and DVI files from Texinfo input now use the
278 '--build-dir' option, to keep the auxiliary files used by texi2dvi
279 and texi2pdf around without cluttering the build directory, and to
280 make it possible to run the "dvi" and "pdf" recipes in parallel.
282 * Automatic remake rules and 'missing' script:
284 - The 'missing' script no longer tries to update the timestamp of
285 out-of-date files that require a maintainer-specific tool to be
286 remade, in case the user lacks such a tool (or has a too-old version
287 of it). It just gives a useful warning, and in some cases also a
288 tip about how to obtain such a tool.
290 - The missing script has thus become useless as a (poor) way to work
291 around the sketched-timestamps issues that can happen for projects
292 that keep generated files committed in their VCS repository. Such
293 projects are now encouraged to write a custom "fix-timestamps.sh"
294 script to avoid such issues; a simple example is provided in the
295 "CVS and generated files" chapter of the automake manual.
299 - The user can now define his own recursive targets that recurse
300 in the directories specified in $(SUBDIRS). This can be done by
301 specifying the name of such targets in invocations of the new
302 'AM_EXTRA_RECURSIVE_TARGETS' m4 macro.
306 - Any failure in the recipe of the "tags", "ctags", "cscope" or
307 "cscopelist" targets in a subdirectory is now propagated to the
308 top-level make invocation.
310 - Tags are correctly computed also for files in _SOURCES variables that
311 only list files with non-standard suffixes (see automake bug#12372).
313 * Improvements to aclocal and related rebuilds rules:
315 - Autoconf-provided macros AC_CONFIG_MACRO_DIR and AC_CONFIG_MACRO_DIRS
316 are now traced by aclocal, and can be used to declare the local m4
317 include directories. Formerly, one had to specify it with an explicit
318 '-I' option to the 'aclocal' invocation.
320 - The special make variable ACLOCAL_AMFLAGS is deprecated; future
321 Automake versions will warn about its use, and later version will
322 remove support for it altogether.
324 * The depcomp script:
326 - Dropped support for libtool 1.4.
328 - Various internal refactorings. They should cause no visible change,
329 but the chance for regression is there anyway, so please report any
330 unexpected or suspicious behaviour.
332 - Support for pre-8.0 versions of the Intel C Compiler has been dropped.
333 This should cause no problem, since icc 8.0 has been released in
334 December 2003 -- almost nine years ago.
336 - Support for tcc (the Tiny C Compiler) has been improved, and is now
337 handled through a dedicated 'tcc' mode.
341 - ylwrap generates header guards with a single '_' for series of non
342 alphabetic characters, instead of several. This is what Bison >=
345 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
347 Bugs fixed in 1.12.6:
349 * Python-related bugs:
351 - The default installation location for python modules has been improved
352 for Python 3 on Debian and Ubuntu systems, changing from:
354 ${prefix}/lib/python3/dist-packages
358 ${prefix}/lib/python3.x/site-packages
360 This change should ensure modules installed using the default ${prefix}
361 "/usr/local" are found by default by system python 3.x installations.
362 See automake bug#10227.
364 - Python byte-compilation supports the new layout mandated by PEP-3147,
365 with its __pycache__ directory (automake bug#8847).
367 * Build system issues:
369 - The maintainer rebuild rules for Makefiles and aclocal.m4 in
370 Automake's own build system works correctly again (bug introduced
375 - The Vala-related tests has been changed to adjust to the removal of
376 the 'posix' profile in the valac compiler. See automake bug#12934
379 - Some spurious testsuite failures related to older tools and systems
382 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
388 - The AM_PROG_VALAC macro has been enhanced to takes two further
389 optional arguments; it's signature now being
391 AM_PROG_VALAC([MINIMUM-VERSION], [ACTION-IF-FOUND],
392 [ACTION-IF-NOT-FOUND])
394 - By default, AM_PROG_VALAC no longer aborts the configure invocation
395 if the Vala compiler found is too old, but simply prints a warning
396 messages (as it did when the Vala compiler was not found). This
397 should avoid unnecessary difficulties for end users that just want
398 to compile the unmodified, distributed Vala-generated C sources,
399 but happens to have an old Vala compiler in their PATH. This fixes
402 - If no proper Vala compiler is found at configure runtime, AM_PROG_VALAC
403 will set the AC_SUBST'd variable 'VALAC' to 'valac' rather than to ':'.
404 This is a better default, because with it a triggered makefile rule
405 invoking a Vala compilation will clearly fail with an informative error
406 message like "valac: command not found", rather than silently, with
407 the error possibly going unnoticed or triggering harder-to-diagnose
408 fallout failures in later steps.
410 * Miscellaneous changes:
412 - automake and aclocal no longer honours the 'perllibdir' environment
413 variable. That had always been intended only as an hack required in
414 the testsuite, not meant for any use beyond that.
416 Bugs fixed in 1.12.5:
418 * Long-standing bugs:
420 - Automake no longer generates spurious remake rules invoking autoheader
421 to regenerate the template corresponding to header files specified after
422 the first one in AC_CONFIG_HEADERS (automake bug#12495).
424 - When wrapping Microsoft tools, the 'compile' script falls back to
425 finding classic 'libname.a' style libraries when 'name.lib' and
426 'name.dll.lib' aren't available.
428 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
432 * Warnings and deprecations:
434 - Warnings in the 'obsolete' category are enabled by default both in
435 automake and aclocal.
437 * Miscellaneous changes:
439 - Some testsuite weaknesses and spurious failures have been fixed.
441 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
445 * Miscellaneous changes:
447 - The '.m4' files provided by Automake no longer define serial numbers.
448 This should cause no difference in the behaviour of aclocal though.
450 - Some testsuite weaknesses and spurious failures have been fixed.
452 - There is initial support for automatic dependency tracking with the
453 Portland Group C/C++ compilers, thanks to the new new depmode 'pgcc'.
455 Bugs fixed in 1.12.3:
457 * Long-standing bugs:
459 - Instead of renaming only self-references of files (typically for
460 #lines), ylwrap now also renames references to the other generated
461 files. This fixes support for GLR and C++ parsers from Bison (PR
462 automake/491 and automake bug#7648): 'parser.c' now properly
463 #includes 'parser.h' instead of 'y.tab.h'.
465 - Generated files unknown to ylwrap are now preserved. This fixes
466 C++ support for Bison (automake bug#7648): location.hh and the
467 like are no longer discarded.
469 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
473 * Warnings and deprecations:
475 - Automake now issues a warning (in the 'portability' category) if
476 'configure.in' is used instead of 'configure.ac' as the Autoconf
477 input file. Such a warning will also be present in the next
478 Autoconf version (2.70).
482 - Recursive cleaning rules descends into the $(SUBDIRS) in the natural
483 order (as done by the other recursive rules), rather than in the
484 inverse order. They used to do that in order to work a round a
485 limitation in an older implementation of the automatic dependency
486 tracking support, but that limitation had been lifted years ago
487 already, when the automatic dependency tracking based on side-effects
488 of compilation had been introduced.
490 - Cleaning rules for compiled objects (both "plain" and libtool) work
491 better when subdir objects are involved, not triggering a distinct
492 'rm' invocation for each such object. They do so by removing *any*
493 compiled object file that is in the same directory of a subdir
494 object. See automake bug#10697.
496 * Silent rules support:
498 - A new predefined $(AM_V_P) make variable is provided; it expands
499 to a shell conditional that can be used in recipes to know whether
500 make is being run in silent or verbose mode.
502 Bugs fixed in 1.12.2:
504 * SECURITY VULNERABILITIES!
506 - The 'distcheck' recipe no longer grants temporary world-write
507 permissions on the extracted distdir. Even if such rights were
508 only granted for a vanishingly small time window, the implied
509 race condition proved to be enough to allow a local attacker
510 to run arbitrary code with the privileges of the user running
511 "make distcheck". This is CVE-2012-3386.
513 * Long-standing bugs:
515 - The "recheck" targets behaves better in the face of build failures
516 related to previously failed tests. For example, if a test is a
517 compiled program that must be rerun by "make recheck", and its
518 compilation fails, it will still be rerun by further "make recheck"
519 invocations. See automake bug#11791.
521 * Bugs introduced by 1.12.1:
523 - Automake provides once again the '$(mkdir_p)' make variable and the
524 '@mkdir_p@' substitution (both as simple aliases for '$(MKDIR_P)'),
525 for better backward-compatibility.
527 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
531 * New supported languages:
533 - Support for Objective C++ has been added; it should work similarly to
534 the support for Objective C.
536 * Deprecated obsolescent features:
538 - Use of the long-deprecated two- and three-arguments invocation forms
539 of the AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE macro now elicits a warning in the 'obsolete'
540 category. Starting from some future major Automake release (likely
541 post-1.13), such usages will no longer be allowed.
543 - Support for the "Cygnus-style" trees (enabled by the 'cygnus' option) is
544 now deprecated (its use triggers a warning in the 'obsolete' category).
545 It will be removed in the next major Automake release (1.13).
547 - The long-obsolete (since 1.10) automake-provided $(mkdir_p) make
548 variable, @mkdir_p@ configure-time substitution and AM_PROG_MKDIR
549 m4 macro are deprecated, eliciting a warning in the 'obsolete'
552 * Miscellaneous changes:
554 - The Automake test cases now require a proper POSIX-conforming shell.
555 Older non-POSIX Bourne shells (like Solaris 10 /bin/sh) will no longer
556 be accepted. In most cases, the user shouldn't have to specify such
557 POSIX shell explicitly, since it will be looked up at configure time.
558 Still, when this lookup fails, or when the user wants to override its
559 conclusion, the variable 'AM_TEST_RUNNER_SHELL' can be used (pointing
560 to the shell that will be used to run the Automake test cases).
562 Bugs fixed in 1.12.1:
564 * Bugs introduced by 1.12:
566 - Several weaknesses in Automake's own build system and test suite
569 * Bugs introduced by 1.11.3:
571 - When given non-option arguments, aclocal rejects them, instead of
572 silently ignoring them.
574 * Long-standing bugs:
576 - When the 'color-tests' option is in use, forcing of colored testsuite
577 output through "AM_COLOR_TESTS=always" works even if the terminal is
578 a non-ANSI one, i.e., if the TERM environment variable has a value of
581 - Several inefficiencies and poor performances in the implementation
582 of the parallel-tests 'check' and 'recheck' targets have been fixed.
584 - The post-processing of output "#line" directives done the ylwrap
585 script is more faithful w.r.t. files in a subdirectory; for example,
586 if the processed file is "src/grammar.y", ylwrap will correctly
587 produce directives like:
588 #line 7 "src/grammar.y"
593 * Bugs with new Perl versions:
595 - Aclocal works correctly with perl 5.16.0 (automake bug#11543).
597 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
601 * Obsolete features removed:
603 - The never documented nor truly used script 'acinstall' has been
606 - Support for automatic de-ANSI-fication has been removed.
608 - The support for the "obscure" multilib feature has been removed
609 from Automake core (but remains available in the 'contrib/'
610 directory of the Automake distribution).
612 - Support for ".log -> .html" conversion and the check-html and
613 recheck-html targets has been removed from Automake core (but
614 remains available in the 'contrib/' directory of the Automake
617 - The deprecated 'lzma' compression format for distribution archives
618 has been removed, in favor of 'xz' and 'lzip'.
620 - The obsolete AM_WITH_REGEX macro has been removed.
622 - The long-deprecated options '--output-dir', '--Werror' and
623 '--Wno-error' have been removed.
625 - The chapter on the history of Automake has been moved out of the
626 reference manual, into a new dedicated Texinfo file.
630 - New 'cscope' target to build a cscope database for the source tree.
632 * Changes to Automake-generated testsuite harnesses:
634 - The new automake option 'serial-tests' has been introduced. It can
635 be used to explicitly instruct automake to use the older serial
636 testsuite harness. This is still the default at the moment, but it
637 might change in future versions.
639 - The 'recheck' target (provided by the parallel testsuite harness) now
640 depends on the 'all' target. This allows for a better user-experience
641 in test-driven development. See automake bug#11252.
643 - Test scripts that exit with status 99 to signal an "hard error" (e.g.,
644 and unexpected or internal error, or a failure to set up the test case
645 scenario) have their outcome reported as an 'ERROR' now. Previous
646 versions of automake reported such an outcome as a 'FAIL' (the only
647 difference with normal failures being that hard errors were counted
648 as failures even when the test originating them was listed in
651 - The testsuite summary displayed by the parallel-test harness has a
652 completely new format, that always list the numbers of passed, failed,
653 xfailed, xpassed, skipped and errored tests, even when these numbers
654 are zero (but using smart coloring when the color-tests option is in
657 - The default testsuite driver offered by the 'parallel-tests' option is
658 now implemented (partly at least) with the help of automake-provided
659 auxiliary scripts (e.g., 'test-driver'), instead of relying entirely
660 on code in the generated Makefile.in.
661 This has two noteworthy implications. The first one is that projects
662 using the 'parallel-tests' option should now either run automake with
663 the '--add-missing' option, or manually copy the 'test-driver' script
664 into their tree. The second, and more important, implication is that
665 now, when the 'parallel-tests' option is in use, TESTS_ENVIRONMENT can
666 no longer be used to define a test runner, and the command specified
667 in LOG_COMPILER (and <ext>_LOG_COMPILER) must be a *real* executable
668 program or script. For example, this is still a valid usage (albeit
671 TESTS_ENVIRONMENT = \
672 if test -n '$(STRICT_TESTS)'; then \
673 maybe_errexit='-e'; \
677 LOG_COMPILER = $(SHELL) $$maybe_errexit
679 OTOH, this is no longer a valid usage:
681 TESTS_ENVIRONMENT = \
682 $(SHELL) `test -n '$(STRICT_TESTS_CHECKING)' && echo ' -e'`
686 TESTS_ENVIRONMENT = \
687 run_with_perl_or_shell () \
689 if grep -q '^#!.*perl' $$1; then
695 LOG_COMPILER = run_with_perl_or_shell
697 - The package authors can now use customary testsuite drivers within
698 the framework provided by the 'parallel-tests' testsuite harness.
699 Consistently with the existing syntax, this can be done by defining
700 special makefile variables 'LOG_DRIVER' and '<ext>_LOG_DRIVER'.
702 - A new developer-reserved variable 'AM_TESTS_FD_REDIRECT' can be used
703 to redirect/define file descriptors used by the test scripts.
705 - The parallel-tests harness generates now, in addition the '.log' files
706 holding the output produced by the test scripts, a new set of '.trs'
707 files, holding "metadata" derived by the execution of the test scripts;
708 among such metadata are the outcomes of the test cases run by a script.
710 - Initial and still experimental support for the TAP test protocol is
713 * Changes to Yacc and Lex support:
715 - C source and header files derived from non-distributed Yacc and/or
716 Lex sources are now removed by a simple "make clean" (while they were
717 previously removed only by "make maintainer-clean").
719 - Slightly backward-incompatible change, relevant only for use of Yacc
720 with C++: the extensions of the header files produced by the Yacc
721 rules are now modelled after the extension of the corresponding
722 sources. For example, yacc files named "foo.y++" and "bar.yy" will
723 produce header files named "foo.h++" and "bar.hh" respectively, where
724 they would have previously produced header files named simply "foo.h"
725 and "bar.h". This change offers better compatibility with 'bison -o'.
727 * Miscellaneous changes:
729 - The AM_PROG_VALAC macro now causes configure to exit with status 77,
730 rather than 1, if the vala compiler found is too old.
732 - The build system of Automake itself now avoids the use of make
733 recursion as much as possible.
735 - Automake now prefers to quote 'like this' or "like this", rather
736 than `like this', in diagnostic message and generated Makefiles,
737 to accommodate the new GNU Coding Standards recommendations.
739 - Automake has a new option '--print-libdir' that prints the path of the
740 directory containing the Automake-provided scripts and data files.
742 - The 'dist' and 'dist-all' targets now can run compressors in parallel.
744 - The rules to create pdf, dvi and ps output from Texinfo files now
745 works better with modern 'texi2dvi' script, by explicitly passing
746 it the '--clean' option to ensure stray auxiliary files are not
747 left to clutter the build directory.
749 - Automake can now generate silenced rules for texinfo outputs.
751 - Some auxiliary files that are automatically distributed by Automake
752 (e.g., 'install-sh', or the 'depcomp' script for packages compiling
753 C sources) might now be listed in the DIST_COMMON variable in many
754 Makefile.in files, rather than in the top-level one.
756 - Messages of types warning or error from 'automake' and 'aclocal'
757 are now prefixed with the respective type, and presence of -Werror
760 - Automake's early configure-time sanity check now tries to avoid
761 sleeping for a second, which slowed down cached configure runs
762 noticeably. In that case, it will check back at the end of the
763 configure script to ensure that at least one second has passed, to
764 avoid time stamp issues with makefile rules rerunning autotools
767 - The warnings in the category 'extra-portability' are now enabled by
768 '-Wall'. In previous versions, one has to use '-Wextra-portability'
773 - Various minor bugfixes for recent or long-standing bugs.
775 * Bugs introduced by 1.11:
777 - The AM_COND_IF macro also works if the shell expression for the
778 conditional is no longer valid for the condition.
780 - The automake-provided parallel testsuite harness no longer fails
781 with BSD make used in parallel mode when there are test scripts in
782 a subdirectory, like in:
784 TESTS = sub/foo.test sub/bar.test
786 * Long-standing bugs:
788 - Automake's own build system finally have a real "installcheck" target.
790 - Vala-related cleanup rules are now more complete, and work better in
793 - Files listed with the AC_REQUIRE_AUX_FILE macro in configure.ac are
794 now automatically distributed also if the directory of the auxiliary
795 files coincides with the top-level directory.
797 - Automake now detects the presence of the '-d' flag in the various
798 '*YFLAGS' variables even when their definitions involve indirections
799 through other variables, such as in:
801 AM_YFLAGS = $(foo_opts)
803 - Automake now complains if a '*YFLAGS' variable has any conditional
804 content, not only a conditional definition.
806 - Explicit enabling and/or disabling of Automake warning categories
807 through the '-W...' options now always takes precedence over the
808 implicit warning level implied by Automake strictness (foreign, gnu
809 or gnits), regardless of the order in which such strictness and
810 warning flags appear. For example, a setting like:
811 AUTOMAKE_OPTIONS = -Wall --foreign
812 will cause the warnings in category 'portability' to be enabled, even
813 if those warnings are by default disabled in 'foreign' strictness.
815 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
817 Bugs fixed in 1.11.5:
819 * Bugs introduced by 1.11.3:
821 - Vala files with '.vapi' extension are now recognized and handled
822 correctly again. See automake bug#11222.
824 - Vala support work again for projects that contain some program
825 built from '.vala' (and possibly '.c') sources and some other
826 program built from '.c' sources *only*. See automake bug#11229.
828 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
832 * Miscellaneous changes:
834 - The 'ar-lib' script now ignores the "s" (symbol index) and "S" (no
835 symbol index) modifiers as well as the "s" action, as the symbol index
836 is created unconditionally by Microsoft lib. Also, the "q" (quick)
837 action is now a synonym for "r" (replace). Also, the script has been
838 ignoring the "v" (verbose) modifier already since Automake 1.11.3.
840 - When the 'compile' script is used to wrap MSVC, it now accepts an
841 optional space between the -I, -L and -l options and their respective
842 arguments, for better POSIX compliance.
844 - There is an initial, experimental support for automatic dependency
845 tracking with tcc (the Tiny C Compiler). Its associated depmode is
846 currently recognized as "icc" (but this and other details are likely
847 to change in future versions).
849 - Automatic dependency tracking now works also with the IBM XL C/C++
850 compilers, thanks to the new new depmode 'xlc'.
852 Bugs fixed in 1.11.4:
854 * Bugs introduced by 1.11.2:
856 - A definition of 'noinst_PYTHON' before 'python_PYTHON' (or similar)
857 no longer cause spurious failures upon "make install".
859 - The user can now instruct the 'uninstall-info' rule not to update
860 the '${infodir}/dir' file by exporting the environment variable
861 'AM_UPDATE_INFO_DIR' to the value "no". This is done for consistency
862 with how the 'install-info' rule operates since automake 1.11.2.
864 * Long-standing bugs:
866 - It is now possible for a foo_SOURCES variable to hold Vala sources
867 together with C header files, as well as with sources and headers for
868 other supported languages (e.g., C++). Previously, only mixing C and
869 Vala sources was supported.
871 - If "aclocal --install" is used, and the first directory specified with
872 '-I' is non-existent, aclocal will now create it before trying to copy
875 - An empty declaration of a "foo_PRIMARY" no longer cause the generated
876 install rules to create an empty $(foodir) directory; for example, if
877 Makefile.am contains something like:
881 pkglibexec_SCRIPTS += bar.sh
884 the $(pkglibexec) directory will not be created upon "make install".
886 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
890 * Miscellaneous changes:
892 - Automake's own build system is more silent by default, making use of
893 the 'silent-rules' option.
895 - The master copy of the 'gnupload' script is now maintained in gnulib,
898 - The 'missing' script no longer tries to wrap calls to 'tar'.
900 - "make dist" no longer wraps 'tar' invocations with the 'missing'
901 script. Similarly, the obsolescent variable '$(AMTAR)' (which you
902 shouldn't be using BTW ;-) no longer invokes the 'missing' script
903 to wrap tar, but simply invokes the 'tar' program itself.
905 - "make dist" can now create lzip-compressed tarballs.
907 - In the Automake info documentation, the Top node and the nodes about
908 the invocation of the automake and aclocal programs have been renamed;
909 now, calling "info automake" will open the Top node, while calling
910 "info automake-invocation" and "info aclocal-invocation" will access
911 the nodes about the invocation of respectively automake and aclocal.
913 - Automake is now distributed as a gzip-compressed and an xz-compressed
914 tarball. Previously, bzip2 was used instead of xz.
916 - The last relics of Python 1.5 support have been removed from the
917 AM_PATH_PYTHON macro.
919 - For programs and libraries, automake now detects EXTRA_foo_DEPENDENCIES
920 and adds them to the normal list of dependencies, but without
921 overwriting the foo_DEPENDENCIES variable, which is normally computed
924 Bugs fixed in 1.11.3:
926 * Bugs introduced by 1.11.2:
928 - Automake now correctly recognizes the prefix/primary combination
929 'pkglibexec_SCRIPTS' as valid.
931 - The parallel-tests harness no longer trips on sed implementations
932 with stricter limits on the length of input lines (problem seen at
935 * Long-standing bugs:
937 - The "deleted header file problem" for *.am files is avoided by stub
938 rules. This allows 'make' to trigger a rerun of 'automake' also if
939 some previously needed '.am' file has been removed.
941 - The 'silent-rules' option now generates working makefiles even
942 for the uncommon 'make' implementations that do not support the
943 nested-variables extension to POSIX 2008. For such 'make'
944 implementations, whether a build is silent is determined at
945 configure time, and cannot be overridden at make time with
946 "make V=0" or "make V=1".
948 - Vala support now works better in VPATH setups.
950 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
954 * Changes to aclocal:
956 - The `--acdir' option is deprecated. Now you should use the new options
957 `--automake-acdir' and `--system-acdir' instead.
959 - The `ACLOCAL_PATH' environment variable is now interpreted as a
960 colon-separated list of additional directories to search after the
961 automake internal acdir (by default ${prefix}/share/aclocal-APIVERSION)
962 and before the system acdir (by default ${prefix}/share/aclocal).
964 * Miscellaneous changes:
966 - The Automake support for automatic de-ANSI-fication has been
967 deprecated. It will probably be removed in the next major Automake
970 - The `lzma' compression scheme and associated automake option `dist-lzma'
971 is obsoleted by `xz' and `dist-xz' due to upstream changes.
973 - You may adjust the compression options used in dist-xz and dist-bzip2.
974 The default is now merely -e for xz, but still -9 for bzip; you may
975 specify a different level via the XZ_OPT and BZIP2 envvars respectively.
976 E.g., "make dist-xz XZ_OPT=-7" or "make dist-bzip2 BZIP2=-5"
978 - The `compile' script now converts some options for MSVC for a better
979 user experience. Similarly, the new `ar-lib' script wraps Microsoft lib.
981 - The py-compile script now accepts empty arguments passed to the options
982 `--destdir' and `--basedir', and complains about unrecognized options.
983 Moreover, a non-option argument or a special `--' argument terminates
986 - A developer that needs to pass specific flags to configure at "make
987 distcheck" time can now, and indeed is advised to, do so by defining
988 the developer-reserved makefile variable AM_DISTCHECK_CONFIGURE_FLAGS,
989 instead of the old DISTCHECK_CONFIGURE_FLAGS.
990 The DISTCHECK_CONFIGURE_FLAGS variable should now be reserved for the
991 user; still, the old Makefile.am files that used to define it will
992 still continue to work as before.
994 - New macro AM_PROG_AR that looks for an archiver and wraps it in the new
995 'ar-lib' auxiliary script if the selected archiver is Microsoft lib.
996 This new macro is required for LIBRARIES and LTLIBRARIES when automake
997 is run with -Wextra-portability and -Werror.
999 - When using DejaGnu-based testsuites, the user can extend the `site.exp'
1000 file generated by automake-provided rules by defining the special make
1001 variable `$(EXTRA_DEJAGNU_SITE_CONFIG)'.
1003 - The `install-info' rule can now be instructed not to create/update
1004 the `${infodir}/dir' file, by exporting the new environment variable
1005 `AM_UPDATE_INFO_DIR' to the value "no".
1007 Bugs fixed in 1.11.2:
1009 * Bugs introduced by 1.11:
1011 - The parallel-tests driver no longer produces erroneous results with
1012 Tru64/OSF 5.1 sh upon unreadable log files.
1014 - The `parallel-tests' test driver does not report spurious successes
1015 when used with concurrent FreeBSD make (e.g., "make check -j3").
1017 - When the parallel-tests driver is in use, automake now explicitly
1018 rejects invalid entries and conditional contents in TEST_EXTENSIONS,
1019 instead of issuing confusing and apparently unrelated error messages
1020 (e.g., "non-POSIX variable name", "bad characters in variable name",
1021 or "redefinition of TEST_EXTENSIONS), or even, in some situations,
1022 silently producing broken `Makefile.in' files.
1024 - The `silent-rules' option now truly silences all compile rules, even
1025 when dependency tracking is disabled. Also, when `silent-rules' is
1026 not used, `make' output no longer contains spurious backslash-only
1027 lines, thus once again matching what Automake did before 1.11.
1029 - The AM_COND_IF macro also works if the shell expression for the
1030 conditional is no longer valid for the condition.
1032 * Long-standing bugs:
1034 - The order of Yacc and Lex flags is fixed to be consistent with other
1035 languages: $(AM_YFLAGS) comes before $(YFLAGS), and $(AM_LFLAGS) before
1036 $(LFLAGS), so that the user variables override the developer variables.
1038 - "make distcheck" now correctly complains also when "make uninstall"
1039 leaves one and only one file installed in $(prefix).
1041 - A "make uninstall" issued before a "make install", or after a mere
1042 "make install-data" or a mere "make install-exec" does not spuriously
1045 - Automake now warns about more primary/directory invalid combinations,
1046 such as "doc_LIBRARIES" or "pkglib_PROGRAMS".
1048 - Rules generated by Automake now try harder to not change any files when
1049 `make -n' is invoked. Fixes include compilation of Emacs Lisp, Vala, or
1050 Yacc source files and the rule to update config.h.
1052 - Several scripts and the parallel-tests testsuite driver now exit with
1053 the right exit status upon receiving a signal.
1055 - A per-Makefile.am setting of -Werror does not erroneously carry over
1056 to the handling of other Makefile.am files.
1058 - The code for automatic dependency tracking works around a Solaris
1059 make bug triggered by sources containing repeated slashes when the
1060 `subdir-objects' option was used.
1062 - The makedepend and hp depmodes now work better with VPATH builds.
1064 - Java sources specified with check_JAVA are no longer compiled for
1065 "make all", but only for "make check".
1067 - An usage like "java_JAVA = foo.java" will now cause Automake to warn
1068 and error out if `javadir' is undefined, instead of silently producing
1069 a broken Makefile.in.
1071 - aclocal and automake now honour the configure-time definitions of
1072 AUTOCONF and AUTOM4TE when they spawn autoconf or autom4te processes.
1074 - The `install-info' recipe no longer tries to guess whether the
1075 `install-info' program is from Debian or from GNU, and adaptively
1076 change its behaviour; this has proven to be frail and easy to
1079 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1081 Bugs fixed in 1.11.1:
1083 - Lots of minor bugfixes.
1085 * Bugs introduced by 1.11:
1087 - The `parallel-tests' test driver works around a GNU make 3.80 bug with
1088 trailing white space in the test list (`TESTS = foo $(EMPTY)').
1090 * Long standing bugs:
1092 - On Darwin 9, `pythondir' and `pyexecdir' pointed below `/Library/Python'
1093 even if the `--prefix' argument pointed outside of a system directory.
1094 AM_PATH_PYTHON has been fixed to ignore the value returned from python's
1095 `get_python_lib' function if it points outside the configured prefix,
1096 unless the `--prefix' argument was either `/usr' or below `/System'.
1098 - The testsuite does not try to change the mode of `ltmain.sh' files from
1099 a Libtool installation (symlinked to test directories) any more.
1101 - AM_PROG_GCJ uses AC_CHECK_TOOLS to look for `gcj' now, so that prefixed
1102 tools are preferred in a cross-compile setup.
1104 - The distribution is tarred up with mode 755 now by the `dist*' targets.
1105 This fixes a race condition where untrusted users could modify files
1106 in the $(PACKAGE)-$(VERSION) distdir before packing if the toplevel
1107 build directory was world-searchable. This is CVE-2009-4029.
1109 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1113 * Version requirements:
1115 - Autoconf 2.62 or greater is required.
1117 * Changes to aclocal:
1119 - The autoconf version check implemented by aclocal in aclocal.m4
1120 (and new in Automake 1.10) is degraded to a warning. This helps
1121 in the common case where the Autoconf versions used are compatible.
1123 * Changes to automake:
1125 - The automake program can run multiple threads for creating most
1126 Makefile.in files concurrently, if at least Perl 5.7.2 is available
1127 with interpreter-based threads enabled. Set the environment variable
1128 AUTOMAKE_JOBS to the maximum number of threads to use, in order to
1129 enable this experimental feature.
1131 * Changes to Libtool support:
1133 - Libtool generic flags are now passed to the install and uninstall
1136 - distcheck works with Libtool 2.x even when LT_OUTPUT is used, as
1137 config.lt is removed correctly now.
1139 * Languages changes:
1141 - subdir-object mode works now with Fortran (F77, FC, preprocessed
1142 Fortran, and Ratfor).
1144 - For files with extension .f90, .f95, .f03, or .f08, the flag
1145 $(FCFLAGS_f[09]x) computed by AC_FC_SRCEXT is now used in compile rules.
1147 - Files with extension .sx are also treated as preprocessed assembler.
1149 - The default source file extension (.c) can be overridden with
1150 AM_DEFAULT_SOURCE_EXT now.
1152 - Python 3.0 is supported now, Python releases prior to 2.0 are no
1155 - AM_PATH_PYTHON honors python's idea about the site directory.
1157 - There is initial support for the Vala programming language, when using
1158 Vala 0.7.0 or later.
1160 * Miscellaneous changes:
1162 - Automake development is done in a git repository on Savannah now, see
1164 http://git.sv.gnu.org/gitweb/?p=automake.git
1166 A read-only CVS mirror is provided at
1168 cvs -d :pserver:anonymous@pserver.git.sv.gnu.org:/automake.git \
1169 checkout -d automake HEAD
1171 - "make dist" can now create xz-compressed tarballs,
1172 as well as (deprecated?) lzma-compressed tarballs.
1174 - `automake --add-missing' will by default install the GPLv3 file as
1175 COPYING if it is missing. It will also warn that the license file
1176 should be added to source control. Note that Automake will never
1177 overwrite an existing COPYING file, even when the `--force-missing'
1180 - The manual is now distributed under the terms of the GNU FDL 1.3.
1182 - Automake ships and installs man pages for automake and aclocal now.
1184 - New shorthand `$(pkglibexecdir)' for `$(libexecdir)/@PACKAGE@'.
1186 - install-sh supports -C, which does not update the installed file
1187 (and its time stamps) if the contents did not change.
1189 - The `gnupload' script has been revamped.
1191 - The `depcomp' and `compile' scripts now work with MSVC under MSYS.
1193 - The targets `install' and `uninstall' are more efficient now, in that
1194 for example multiple files from one Automake variable such as
1195 `bin_SCRIPTS' are copied in one `install' (or `libtool --mode=install')
1196 invocation if they do not have to be renamed.
1198 Both install and uninstall may sometimes enter (`cd' into) the target
1199 installation directory now, when no build-local scripts are used.
1201 Both install and uninstall do not fail anymore but do nothing if an
1202 installation directory variable like `bindir' is set to the empty string.
1204 For built-in rules, `make install' now fails reliably if installation
1205 of a file failed. Conversely, `make uninstall' even succeeds when
1206 issued multiple times.
1208 These changes may need some adjustments from users: For example,
1209 some `install' programs refuse to install multiple copies of the
1210 same file in one invocation, so you may need to remove duplicate
1211 entries from file lists.
1213 Also, within one set of files, say, nobase_data_DATA, the order of
1214 installation may be changed, or even unstable among different hosts,
1215 due to the use of associative arrays in awk. The increased use of
1216 awk matches a similar move in Autoconf to provide for better scaling.
1218 Further, most undocumented per-rule install command variables such as
1219 binSCRIPT_INSTALL have been removed because they are not needed any
1220 more. Packages which use them should be using the appropriate one of
1221 INSTALL_{DATA,PROGRAM,SCRIPT} or their install_sh_{DATA,PROGRAM,SCRIPT}
1222 counterpart, depending on the type of files and the need for automatic
1223 target directory creation.
1225 - The "deleted header file problem" for *.m4 files is avoided by
1226 stub rules. This allows `make' to trigger a rerun of `aclocal'
1227 also if some previously needed macro file has been removed.
1229 - Rebuild rules now also work for a removed `subdir/Makefile.in' in
1230 an otherwise up to date tree.
1232 - The `color-tests' option causes colored test result output on terminals.
1234 - The `parallel-tests' option enables a new test driver that allows for
1235 parallel test execution, inter-test dependencies, lazy test execution
1236 for unit-testing, re-testing only failed tests, and formatted result output
1237 as RST (reStructuredText) and HTML. Enabling this option may require some
1238 changes to your test suite setup; see the manual for details.
1240 - The `silent-rules' option enables Linux kernel-style silent build output.
1241 This option requires the widely supported but non-POSIX `make' feature
1242 of recursive variable expansion, so do not use it if your package needs
1243 to build with `make' implementations that do not support it.
1245 To enable less verbose build output, the developer has to use the Automake
1246 option `silent-rules' in `AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE', or call the `AM_SILENT_RULES'
1247 macro. The user may then set the default verbosity by passing the
1248 `--enable-silent-rules' option to `configure'. At `make' run time, this
1249 default may be overridden using `make V=0' for less verbose, and `make V=1'
1250 for backward-compatible verbose output.
1252 - New prefix `notrans_' for manpages which should not be transformed
1253 by --program-transform.
1255 - New macro AM_COND_IF for conditional evaluation and conditional
1258 - For AC_CONFIG_LINKS, if source and destination are equal, do not
1259 remove the file in a non-VPATH build. Such setups work with Autoconf
1262 - AM_MAINTAINER_MODE now allows for an optional argument specifying
1263 the default setting.
1265 - AM_SUBST_NOTMAKE may prevent substitution of AC_SUBSTed variables,
1266 useful especially for multi-line values.
1268 - Automake's early configure-time sanity check now diagnoses an
1269 unsafe absolute source directory name and makes configure fail.
1271 - The Automake macros and rules cope better with whitespace in the
1272 current directory name, as long as the relative path to `configure'
1273 does not contain whitespace. To this end, the values of `$(MISSING)'
1274 and `$(install_sh)' may contain suitable quoting, and their expansion
1275 might need `eval'uation if used outside of a makefile. These
1276 undocumented variables may be used in several documented macros such
1277 as $(AUTOCONF) or $(MAKEINFO).
1281 * Long-standing bugs:
1283 - Fix aix dependency tracking for libtool objects.
1285 - Work around AIX sh quoting issue in AC_PROG_CC_C_O, leading to
1286 unnecessary use of the `compile' script.
1288 - For nobase_*_LTLIBRARIES with nonempty directory components, the
1289 correct `-rpath' argument is used now.
1291 - `config.status --file=Makefile depfiles' now also works with the
1292 extra quoting used internally by Autoconf 2.62 and newer
1293 (it used to work only without the `--file=' bit).
1295 - The `missing' script works better with versioned tool names.
1297 - Semantics for `missing help2man' have been revamped:
1299 Previously, if `help2man' was not present, `missing help2man' would have
1300 the following semantics: if some man page was out of date but present, then
1301 a warning would be printed, but the exit status was 0. If the man page was
1302 not present at all, then `missing' would create a replacement man page
1303 containing an error message, and exit with a status of 2. This does not play
1304 well with `make': the next run will see this particular man page as being up
1305 to date, and will only error out on the next generated man page, if any;
1306 repeat until all pages are done. This was not desirable.
1308 These are the new semantics: if some man page is not present, and help2man
1309 is not either, then `missing' will warn and generate the replacement page
1310 containing the error message, but exit successfully. However, `make dist'
1311 will ensure that no such bogus man pages are packaged into a tarball.
1313 - Targets provided by automake behave better with `make -n', in that they
1314 take care not to create files.
1316 - `config.status Makefile... depfiles' works fine again in the presence of
1317 disabled dependency tracking.
1319 - The default no-op recursive rules for these targets also work with BSD make
1320 now: html, install-html, install-dvi, install-pdf, install-pdf, install-info.
1322 - `make distcheck' works also when both a directory and some file below it
1323 have been added to a distribution variable, such as EXTRA_DIST or *_SOURCES.
1325 - Texinfo dvi, ps, pdf, and html output files are not removed upon
1326 `make mostlyclean' any more; only the LaTeX by-products are.
1328 - Renamed objects also work with the `subdir-objects' option and
1329 source file languages which Automake does not know itself.
1331 - `automake' now correctly complains about variable assignments which are
1332 preceded by a comment, extend over multiple lines with backslash-escaped
1333 newlines, and end in a comment sign. Previous versions would silently
1334 and wrongly ignore such assignments completely.
1336 * Bugs introduced by 1.10:
1338 - Fix output of dummy dependency files in presence of post-processed
1339 Makefile.in's again, but also cope with long lines.
1341 - $(EXEEXT) is automatically appended to filenames of XFAIL_TESTS
1342 that have been declared as programs in the same Makefile.
1343 This is for consistency with the analogous change to TESTS in 1.10.
1345 - Fix order of standard includes to again be `-I. -I$(srcdir)',
1346 followed by directories containing config headers.
1348 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1352 * Version requirements:
1354 - Autoconf 2.60 or greater is required.
1356 - Perl 5.6 or greater is required.
1358 * Changes to aclocal:
1360 - aclocal now also supports -Wmumble and -Wno-mumble options.
1362 - `dirlist' entries (for the aclocal search path) may use shell
1363 wildcards such as `*', `?', or `[...]'.
1365 - aclocal supports an --install option that will cause system-wide
1366 third-party macros to be installed in the local directory
1367 specified with the first -I flag. This option also uses #serial
1368 lines in M4 files to upgrade local macros.
1370 The new aclocal options --dry-run and --diff help to review changes
1371 before they are installed.
1373 - aclocal now outputs an autoconf version check in aclocal.m4 in
1374 projects using automake.
1376 For a few years, automake and aclocal have been calling autoconf
1377 (or its underlying engine autom4te) to accurately retrieve the
1378 data they need from configure.ac and its siblings. Doing so can
1379 only work if all autotools use the same version of autoconf. For
1380 instance a Makefile.in generated by automake for one version of
1381 autoconf may stop working if configure is regenerated with another
1382 version of autoconf, and vice versa.
1384 This new version check ensures that the whole build system has
1385 been generated using the same autoconf version.
1387 * Support for new Autoconf macros:
1389 - The new AC_REQUIRE_AUX_FILE Autoconf macro is supported.
1391 - If `subdir-objects' is set, and AC_CONFIG_LIBOBJ_DIR is specified,
1392 $(LIBOBJS), $(LTLIBOBJS), $(ALLOCA), and $(LTALLOCA) can be used
1393 in different directories. However, only one instance of such a
1394 library objects directory is supported.
1396 * Change to Libtool support:
1398 - Libtool generic flags (those that go before the --mode=MODE option)
1399 can be specified using AM_LIBTOOLFLAGS and target_LIBTOOLFLAGS.
1401 * Yacc and Lex changes:
1403 - The rebuild rules for distributed Yacc and Lex output will avoid
1404 overwriting existing files if AM_MAINTAINER_MODE and maintainer-mode
1407 - ylwrap is now always used for lex and yacc source files,
1408 regardless of whether there is more than one source per directory.
1410 * Languages changes:
1412 - Preprocessed assembler (*.S) compilation now honors CPPFLAGS,
1413 AM_CPPFLAGS and per-target _CPPFLAGS, and supports dependency
1414 tracking, unlike non-preprocessed assembler (*.s).
1416 - subdir-object mode works now with Assembler. Automake assumes
1417 that the compiler understands `-c -o'.
1419 - Preprocessed assembler (*.S) compilation now also honors
1420 $(DEFS) $(DEFAULT_INCLUDES) $(INCLUDES).
1422 - Improved support for Objective C:
1423 - Autoconf's new AC_PROG_OBJC will enable automatic dependency tracking.
1424 - A new section of the manual documents the support.
1426 - New support for Unified Parallel C:
1427 - AM_PROG_UPC looks for a UPC compiler.
1428 - A new section of the manual documents the support.
1430 - Per-target flags are now correctly handled in link rules.
1432 For instance maude_CFLAGS correctly overrides AM_CFLAGS; likewise
1433 for maude_LDFLAGS and AM_LDFLAGS. Previous versions bogusly
1434 preferred AM_CFLAGS over maude_CFLAGS while linking, and they
1435 used both AM_LDFLAGS and maude_LDFLAGS on the same link command.
1437 The fix for compiler flags (i.e., using maude_CFLAGS instead of
1438 AM_CFLAGS) should not hurt any package since that is how _CFLAGS
1439 is expected to work (and actually works during compilation).
1441 However using maude_LDFLAGS "instead of" AM_LDFLAGS rather than
1442 "in addition to" breaks backward compatibility with older versions.
1443 If your package used both variables, as in
1445 AM_LDFLAGS = common flags
1446 bin_PROGRAMS = a b c
1447 a_LDFLAGS = more flags
1450 and assumed *_LDFLAGS would sum up, you should rewrite it as
1452 AM_LDFLAGS = common flags
1453 bin_PROGRAMS = a b c
1454 a_LDFLAGS = $(AM_LDFLAGS) more flags
1457 This new behavior of *_LDFLAGS is more coherent with other
1458 per-target variables, and the way *_LDFLAGS variables were
1459 considered internally.
1461 * New installation targets:
1463 - New targets mandated by GNU Coding Standards:
1468 By default they will only install Texinfo manuals.
1469 You can customize them with *-local variants:
1475 - The undocumented recursive target `uninstall-info' no longer exists.
1476 (`uninstall' is in charge of removing all possible documentation
1477 flavors, including optional formats such as dvi, ps, or info even
1478 when `no-installinfo' is used.)
1480 * Miscellaneous changes:
1482 - Automake no longer complains if input files for AC_CONFIG_FILES
1483 are specified using shell variables.
1485 - clean, distribution, or rebuild rules are normally disabled for
1486 inputs and outputs of AC_CONFIG_FILES, AC_CONFIG_HEADERS, and
1487 AC_CONFIG_LINK specified using shell variables. However, if these
1488 variables are used as ${VAR}, and AC_SUBSTed, then Automake will
1489 be able to output rules anyway.
1490 (See the Automake documentation for AC_CONFIG_FILES.)
1492 - $(EXEEXT) is automatically appended to filenames of TESTS
1493 that have been declared as programs in the same Makefile.
1494 This is mostly useful when some check_PROGRAMS are listed in TESTS.
1496 - `-Wportability' has finally been turned on by default for `gnu' and
1497 `gnits' strictness. This means, automake will complain about %-rules
1498 or $(GNU Make functions) unless you switch to `foreign' strictness or
1499 use `-Wno-portability'.
1501 - Automake now uses AC_PROG_MKDIR_P (new in Autoconf 2.60), and uses
1502 $(MKDIR_P) instead of $(mkdir_p) to create directories. The
1503 $(mkdir_p) variable is still defined (to the same value as
1504 $(MKDIR_P)) but should be considered obsolete. If you are using
1505 $(mkdir_p) in some of your rules, please plan to update them to
1506 $(MKDIR_P) at some point.
1508 - AM_C_PROTOTYPES and ansi2knr are now documented as being obsolete.
1509 They still work in this release, but may be withdrawn in a future one.
1511 - Inline compilation rules for gcc3-style dependency tracking are
1514 - Automake installs a "Hello World!" example package in $(docdir).
1515 This example is used throughout the new "Autotools Introduction"
1516 chapter of the manual.
1518 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1522 * Makefile.in bloat reduction:
1524 - Inference rules are used to compile sources in subdirectories when
1525 the `subdir-objects' option is used and no per-target flags are
1526 used. This should reduce the size of some projects a lot, because
1527 Automake used to output an explicit rule for each such object in
1530 - Automake no longer outputs three rules (.o, .obj, .lo) for each
1531 object that must be built with explicit rules. It just outputs
1532 the rules required to build the kind of object considered: either
1533 the two .o and .obj rules for usual objects, or the .lo rule for
1536 * Change to Libtool support:
1538 - Libtool tags are used with libtool versions that support them.
1539 (I.e., with Libtool 1.5 or greater.)
1541 - Automake is now able to handle setups where a libtool library is
1542 conditionally installed in different directories, as in
1545 lib_LTLIBRARIES = liba.la
1547 pkglib_LTLIBRARIES = liba.la
1549 liba_la_SOURCES = ...
1551 * Changes to aclocal:
1553 - aclocal now ensures that AC_DEFUNs and AU_DEFUNs it discovers are
1554 really evaluated, before it decides to include them in aclocal.m4.
1555 This solves nasty problems with conditional redefinitions of
1556 Autoconf macros in /usr/share/aclocal/*.m4 files causing extraneous
1557 *.m4 files to be included in any project using these macros.
1558 (Calls to AC_PROG_EGREP causing libtool.m4 to be included is the
1559 most famous instance of this bug.)
1561 - Do not complain about missing conditionally AC_REQUIREd macros
1562 that are not actually used. In 1.8.x aclocal would correctly
1563 determine which of these macros were really needed (and include
1564 only these in the package); unfortunately it would also require
1565 all of them to be present in order to run. This created
1566 situations were aclocal would not work on a tarball distributing
1567 all the macros it uses. For instance running aclocal on a project
1568 containing only the subset of the Gettext macros in use by the
1569 project did not work, because gettext conditionally requires other
1572 * Portability improvements:
1574 - Tar format can be chosen with the new options tar-v7, tar-ustar, and
1575 tar-pax. The new option filename-length-max=99 helps diagnosing
1576 filenames that are too long for tar-v7. (PR/414)
1578 - Variables aumented with `+=' are now automatically flattened (i.e.,
1579 trailing backslashes removed) and then wrapped around 80 colummns
1580 (adding trailing backslashes). In previous versions, a long series
1586 would result in a single-line definition of VAR that could possibly
1587 exceed the maximum line length of some make implementations.
1589 Non-augmented variables are still output as they are defined in
1594 - Support Fortran 90/95 with the new "fc" and "ppfc" languages.
1595 Works the same as the old Fortran 77 implementation; just replace
1596 F77 with FC everywhere (exception: FFLAGS becomes FCFLAGS).
1597 Requires a version of autoconf which provides AC_PROG_FC (>=2.59).
1599 - Support for conditional _LISP.
1601 - Support for conditional -hook and -local rules (PR/428).
1603 - Diagnose AC_CONFIG_AUX_DIR calls following AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE. (PR/49)
1605 - Automake will not write any Makefile.ins after the first error it
1606 encounters. The previous Makefile.ins (if any) will be left in
1607 place. (Warnings will not prevent output, but remember they can
1608 be turned into errors with -Werror.)
1610 - The restriction that SUBDIRS must contain direct children is gone.
1613 - The manual tells more about SUBDIRS vs. DIST_SUBDIRS.
1614 It also gives an example of nested packages using AC_CONFIG_SUBDIRS.
1616 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1618 Bugs fixed in 1.8.5:
1620 * Long-standing bugs:
1622 - Define DIST_SUBDIRS even when the `no-dist' or `cygnus' options are used
1623 so that `make distclean' and `make maintainer-clean' can work.
1625 - Define AR and ARFLAGS even when only EXTRA_LIBRARIES are defined.
1627 - Fix many rules to please FreeBSD make, which runs commands with `sh -e'.
1629 - Polish diagnostic when no input file is found.
1631 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1633 Bugs fixed in 1.8.4:
1635 * Long-standing bugs:
1637 - Fix AM_PATH_PYTHON to correctly display $PYTHON when it has been
1638 overridden by the user.
1640 - Honor PATH_SEPARATOR in various places of the Automake package, for
1643 - Adjust dependency tracking mode detection to ICC 8.0's new output.
1646 - Fix install-sh so it can install the `mv' binary... using `mv'.
1648 - Fix tru64 dependency tracking for libtool objects.
1650 - Work around Exuberant Ctags when creating a TAGS files in a directory
1651 without files to scan but with subdirectories to include.
1653 * Bugs introduced by 1.8:
1655 - Fix an "internal error" when @LIBOBJS@ is used in a variable that is
1656 not defined in the same conditions as the _LDADD that uses it.
1658 - Do not warn when JAVAROOT is overridden, this is legitimate.
1660 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1662 Bugs fixed in 1.8.3:
1664 * Long-standing bugs:
1666 - Quote filenames in installation rules, in case $DESTDIR, $prefix,
1667 or any of the other *dir variables contain a space.
1669 Please note that Automake does not and cannot support spaces in
1670 filenames that are involved during the build. This change affects
1671 only installation paths, so that `make install' does not bomb out
1672 in packages configured with
1673 ./configure --prefix '/c/Program Files'
1675 - Fix the depfiles output so it works with GNU sed (<4.1) even when
1676 POSIXLY_CORRECT is set.
1678 - Do not AC_SUBST(LIBOBJS) in AM_WITH_REGEX. This macro was unusable
1679 since Autoconf 2.54, which defines LIBOBJS itself.
1681 - Fix a potential (but unlikely) race condition in parallel elisp
1682 builds. (Introduced in 1.7.3.)
1684 - Do not assume that users override _DEPENDENCIES in all conditions
1685 where Automake will try to define them.
1687 - Do not use `mkdir -p' in mkinstalldirs, unless this is GNU mkdir.
1688 Solaris 8's `mkdir -p' is not thread-safe and can break parallel
1691 This fix also affects the $(mkdir_p) variable defined since
1692 Automake 1.8. It will be set to `mkdir -p' only if mkdir is GNU
1693 mkdir, and to `mkinstalldirs' or `install-sh -d' otherwise.
1695 - Secure temporary directory creation in `make distcheck'. (PR/413)
1697 - Do not generate two build rules for `parser.h' when the
1698 parser appears in two different conditionals.
1700 - Work around a Solaris 8 /bin/sh bug in the test for dependency
1701 checking. Usually ./configure will not pick this shell; so this
1702 fix only helps cases where the shell is forced to /bin/sh.
1704 * Bugs introduced by 1.8:
1706 - In some situations (hand-written `m4_include's), aclocal would
1707 call the `File::Spec->rel2abs' method, which was only introduced
1708 in Perl 5.6. This new version reestablish support Perl 5.005.
1710 It is likely that the next major Automake releases will require at
1711 least Perl 5.6. Consider upgrading your development environment
1712 if you are still using the five-year-old Perl 5.005.
1714 - Automake would sometimes fail to define rules for targets listed
1715 in variables defined in multiple conditions. For instance on
1721 it would define only the `a.$(OBJEXT): a.c' rule and omit the
1722 `b.$(OBJEXT): b.c' rule.
1724 * New sections in manual:
1726 - Third-Party Makefiles: how to interface third party Makefiles.
1727 - Upgrading: upgrading packages to newer Automake versions.
1728 - Multiple Outputs: handling tools that produce many outputs.
1730 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1734 * A (well known) portability bug slipped in the changes made to
1735 install-sh in Automake 1.8.1. The broken install-sh would refuse to
1736 install anything on Tru64.
1738 * Fix install rules for conditionally built python files. (This never
1741 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1745 * Bugs introduced by 1.8:
1747 - Fix Config.pm import error with old Perl versions (at least
1748 5.005_03). One symptom is that aclocal could not find its macro
1751 - Automake 1.8 used `mkdir -m 0755 -p --' to ensure that directories
1752 created by `make install' are always world readable, even if the
1753 installer happens to have an overly restrictive umask (e.g. 077).
1754 This was a mistake and has been reverted. There are at least two
1755 reasons why we must not use `-m 0755':
1756 - it causes special bits like SGID to be ignored,
1757 - it may be too restrictive (some setups expect 775 directories).
1759 - Fix aclocal to honor definitions located in files which have been
1760 m4_included manually. aclocal 1.8 had been updated to check
1761 m4_included files for new requirements, but forgot that these
1762 m4_included files can also provide new definitions.
1764 Note that if you have such a setup, we recommend you get rid of
1765 it. In the past, there was a reason to m4_include files manually:
1766 aclocal used to duplicate entire M4 files into aclocal.m4, even
1767 files that were distributed. Some packages were therefore
1768 m4_including the distributed file directly, and playing some
1769 tricks to ensure aclocal would not copy that file to aclocal.m4,
1770 in order to limit the amount of duplication. Since aclocal 1.8.x
1771 will precisely output m4_includes for local M4 files, we recommend
1772 that you clean up your setup, removing all manual m4_includes and
1773 letting aclocal output them.
1775 - Output detailed menus in the Info version if the Automake manual,
1776 so that Emacs can locate the indexes.
1778 - configure.ac and configure were listed twice in DIST_COMMON (an
1779 internal variable where Automake lists configury files to
1780 distribute). This was harmless, but unaesthetic.
1782 - Use `chmod a-w' instead of `chmod -w' as the latter honors umask.
1783 This was an issue only in the Automake package itself, not in
1786 - Automake assumed that all AC_CONFIG_LINKS arguments had the form
1787 DEST:SRC. This was wrong, as some packages do
1788 AC_CONFIG_LINKS($computedlinks). This version no longer abort in
1791 - Contrary to mkinstalldirs, $(mkdir_p) was expecting exactly one
1792 argument. This caused two kinds of failures:
1793 - Rules installing data in a conditionally defined directory
1794 failed when that directory was undefined. In this case no
1795 argument was supplied.
1796 - `make installdirs' failed, because several directories were
1797 passed to $(mkdir_p). This was an issue only on platform
1798 were $(mkdir_p) is implemented with `install-sh -d'.
1799 $(mkdir_p) as been changed to accept 0 or more arguments, as
1802 * Long-standing bugs:
1804 - Fix an unexpected diagnostic occurring when users attempt
1805 to override some internal variables that Automake appends to.
1807 - aclocal now scans configure.ac for macro definitions (PR/319).
1809 - Fix a portability issue with OSF1/Tru64 Make. If a directory
1810 distributes files which are outside itself (this usually occurs
1811 when using AC_CONFIG_AUX_DIR([../dir]) to use auxiliary files
1812 from a parent package), then `make distcheck' fails due to an
1813 optimization performed by OSF1/Tru64 Make in its VPATH handling.
1814 (tests/subpkg2.test failure)
1816 - Fix another portability issue with Sun and OSF1/Tru64 Make.
1817 In a VPATH-build configuration, `make install' would install
1818 nobase_ files to wrong locations.
1820 - Fix a Perl `uninitialized value' diagnostic occurring when
1821 automake complains that a Texinfo file does not have a
1822 @setfilename statement.
1824 - Erase config.status.lineno during `make distclean'. This file
1825 can be created by config.status. Automake already knew about
1826 configure.lineno, but forgot config.status.lineno.
1828 - Distribute all files, even those which are built and installed
1829 conditionally. This change affects files listed in conditionally
1830 defined *_HEADERS and *_PYTHON variable (unless they are nodist_*)
1831 as well as those listed in conditionally defined dist_*_DATA,
1832 dist_*_JAVA, dist_*_LISP, and dist_*_SCRIPTS variables.
1834 - Fix AM_PATH_LISPDIR to avoid \? in sed regular expressions; it
1835 doesn't conform to POSIX.
1837 - Normalize help strings for configure variables and options added
1842 - Check for python2.4 in AM_PATH_PYTHON.
1844 * Spurious failures in test suite:
1846 - tests/libtool5.test, tests/ltcond.test, tests/ltcond2.test,
1847 tests/ltconv.test: fix failures with CVS Libtool.
1848 - tests/aclocal6.test: fix failure if autom4te.cache is disabled.
1849 - tests/txinfo24.test, tests/txinfo25.test, tests/txinfo28.test:
1850 fix failures with old Texinfo versions.
1852 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1858 - The NEWS file is more verbose.
1862 - Autoconf 2.58 or greater is required.
1866 - Default source file names in the absence of a _SOURCES declaration
1867 are made by removing any target extension before appending `.c', so
1868 to make the libtool module `foo.la' from `foo.c', you only need to
1871 lib_LTLIBRARIES = foo.la
1872 foo_la_LDFLAGS = -module
1874 For backward compatibility, foo_la.c will be used instead of
1875 foo.c if this file exists or is the explicit target of a rule.
1876 However -Wobsolete will warn about this deprecated naming.
1878 - AR's `cru' flags are now set in a global ARFLAGS variable instead
1879 of being hard-coded in each $(AR) invocation, so they can be
1880 substituted from configure.ac. This has been requested by people
1881 dealing with non-POSIX ar implementations.
1883 - New warning option: -Woverride. This will warn about any user
1884 target or variable definitions which override Automake
1887 - Texinfo rules back up and restore info files when makeinfo fails.
1889 - Texinfo rules now support the `html' target.
1890 Running this requires Texinfo 4.0 or greater.
1892 `html' is a new recursive target, so if your package mixes
1893 hand-crafted `Makefile.in's with Automake-generated
1894 `Makefile.in's, you should adjust the former to support (or
1895 ignore) this target so that `make html' recurses successfully. If
1896 you had a custom `html' rule in your `Makefile.am', it's better to
1897 rename it as `html-local', otherwise your rule will override
1898 Automake's new rule (you can check that by running `automake
1899 -Woverride') and that will stop the recursion to subdirectories.
1901 Last but not least, this `html' rule is declared PHONY, even when
1902 overridden. Fortunately, it appears that few packages use a
1903 non-PHONY `html' rule.
1905 - Any file which is m4_included from configure.ac will appear as a
1906 configure and Makefile.in dependency, and will be automatically
1909 - The rules for rebuilding Makefiles and Makefile.ins will now
1910 rebuild all Makefiles and all Makefile.ins at once when one of
1911 configure's dependencies has changed. This is considerably faster
1912 than previous implementations, where config.status and automake
1913 were run separately in each directory (this still happens when you
1914 change a Makefile.am locally, without touching configure.ac or
1915 friends). Doing this also solves a longstanding issue: these
1916 rebuild rules failed to work when adding new directories to the
1917 tree, forcing you to run automake manually.
1919 - For similar reasons, the rules to rebuild configure,
1920 config.status, and aclocal.m4 are now defined in all directories.
1921 Note that if you were using the CONFIG_STATUS_DEPENDENCIES and
1922 CONFIGURE_DEPENDENCIES (formerly undocumented) variables, you
1923 should better define them in all directories. This is easily done
1924 using an AC_SUBST (make sure you prefix these dependencies with
1925 $(top_srcdir) since this variable will appear at different
1926 levels of the build tree).
1928 - aclocal will now use `m4_include' instead of copying local m4
1929 files into aclocal.m4. (Local m4 files are those you ship with
1930 your project, other files will be copied as usual.)
1932 Because m4_included files are automatically distributed, it means
1933 for most projects there is no point in EXTRA_DISTing the list of
1934 m4 files which are used. (You can probably get rid of
1935 m4/Makefile.am if you had one.)
1937 - aclocal will avoid touching aclocal.m4 when possible, so that
1938 Autom4te's cache isn't needlessly invalidated. This behavior can
1939 be switched off with the new `--force' option.
1941 - aclocal now uses Autoconf's --trace to detect macros which are
1942 actually used and will no longer include unused macros simply
1943 because they where mentioned. This was often the case for macros
1944 called conditionally.
1946 - New options no-dist and no-dist-gzip.
1948 - compile, depcomp, elisp-comp, install-sh, mdate-sh, mkinstalldirs,
1949 py-compile, and ylwrap, now all understand --version and --help.
1951 - Automake will now recognize AC_CONFIG_LINKS so far as removing created
1952 links as part of the distclean target and including source files in
1955 - AM_PATH_PYTHON now supports ACTION-IF-FOUND and ACTION-IF-NOT-FOUND
1956 argument. The latter can be used to override the default behavior
1957 (which is to abort).
1959 - Automake will exit with $? = 63 on version mismatch. (So does
1960 Autoconf 2.58) missing knows this, and in this case it will
1961 emulate the tools as if they were absent. Because older versions
1962 of Automake and Autoconf did not use this exit code, this change
1963 will only be useful in projects generated with future versions of
1966 - When using AC_CONFIG_FILES with multiple input files, Automake
1967 generates the first ".in" input file for which a ".am" exists.
1968 (Former versions would try to use only the first input file.)
1970 - lisp_DATA is now allowed. If you are using the empty ELCFILES
1971 idiom to disable byte-compilation of lisp_LISP files, it is
1972 recommended that you switch to using lisp_DATA. Note that
1973 this is not strictly equivalent: lisp_DATA will install elisp
1974 files even if emacs is not installed, while *_LISP do not
1975 install anything unless emacs is found.
1977 - Makefiles will prefer `mkdir -p' over mkinstalldirs if it is
1978 available. This selection is achieved through the Makefile
1979 variable $(mkdir_p) that is set by AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE to either
1980 `mkdir -m 0755 -p --', `$(mkinstalldirs) -m 0755', or
1981 `$(install_sh) -m 0755 -d'.
1985 - Because `mkdir -p' is available on most platforms, and we can use
1986 `install-sh -d' when it is not, the use of the mkinstalldirs
1987 script is being phased out. `automake --add-missing' no longer
1988 installs it, and if you remove mkinstalldirs from your package,
1989 automake will define $(mkinstalldirs) as an alias for $(mkdir_p).
1991 Gettext 0.12.1 still requires mkinstalldirs. Fortunately
1992 gettextize and autopoint will install it when needed. Automake
1993 will continue to define the $(mkinstalldirs) and to distribute
1994 mkinstalldirs when this script is in the source tree.
1996 - AM_PROG_CC_STDC is now empty. The content of this macro was
1997 merged in AC_PROG_CC. If your code uses $am_cv_prog_cc_stdc, you
1998 should adjust it to use $ac_cv_prog_cc_stdc instead. (This
1999 renaming should be safe, even if you have to support several,
2000 versions of Automake, because AC_PROG_CC defines this variable
2001 since Autoconf 2.54.)
2003 - Some users where using the undocumented ACLOCAL_M4_SOURCES
2004 variable to override the aclocal.m4 dependencies computed
2005 (inaccurately) by older versions of Automake. Because Automake
2006 now tracks configure's m4 dependencies accurately (see m4_include
2007 above), the use of ACLOCAL_M4_SOURCES should be considered
2008 obsolete and will be flagged as such when running `automake
2013 - Defining programs conditionally using Automake conditionals no
2014 longer leads to a combinatorial explosion. The following
2015 construct used to be troublesome when used with dozens of
2030 Likewise for _SOURCES, _LDADD, and _LIBADD variables.
2032 - Due to implementation constraints, previous versions of Automake
2033 proscribed multiple conditional definitions of some variables
2043 All _PROGRAMS, _LDADD, and _LIBADD variables were affected.
2044 This restriction has been lifted, and these variables now
2045 support multiple conditional definitions as do other variables.
2047 - Cleanup the definitions of $(distdir) and $(top_distdir).
2048 $(top_distdir) now points to the root of the distribution
2049 directory created during `make dist', as it did in Automake 1.4,
2050 not to the root of the build tree as it did in intervening
2051 versions. Furthermore these two variables are now only defined in
2052 the top level Makefile, and passed to sub-directories when running
2055 - The --no-force option now correctly checks the Makefile.in's
2056 dependencies before deciding not to update it.
2058 - Do not assume that make files are called Makefile in cleaning rules.
2060 - Update .info files in the source tree, not in the build tree. This
2061 is what the GNU Coding Standard recommend. Only Automake 1.7.x
2062 used to update these files in the build tree (previous versions did
2063 it in the source tree too), and it caused several problems, varying
2064 from mere annoyance to portability issues.
2066 - COPYING, COPYING.LIB, and COPYING.LESSER are no longer overwritten
2067 when --add-missing and --force-missing are used. For backward
2068 compatibility --add-missing will continue to install COPYING (in
2069 `gnu' strictness) when none of these three files exist, but this
2070 use is deprecated: you should better choose a license yourself and
2071 install it once for all in your source tree (and in your code
2074 - Fix ylwrap so that it does not overwrite header files that haven't
2075 changed, as the inline rule already does.
2077 - User-defined rules override automake-defined rules for the same
2078 targets, even when rules do not have commands. This is not new
2079 (and was documented), however some of the automake-generated
2080 rules have escaped this principle in former Automake versions.
2081 Rules for the following targets are affected by this fix:
2083 clean, clean-am, dist-all, distclean, distclean-am, dvi, dvi-am,
2084 info, info-am, install-data-am, install-exec-am, install-info,
2085 install-info-am, install-man, installcheck-am, maintainer-clean,
2086 maintainer-clean-am, mostlyclean, mostlyclean-am, pdf, pdf-am,
2087 ps, ps-am, uninstall-am, uninstall-info, uninstall-man
2089 Practically it means that an attempt to supplement the dependencies
2090 of some target, as in
2092 clean: my-clean-rule
2094 will now *silently override* the automake definition of the
2095 rule for this target. Running `automake -Woverride' will diagnose
2096 all such overriding definitions.
2098 It should be noted that almost all of these targets support a *-local
2099 variant that is meant to supplement the automake-defined rule
2100 (See node `Extending' in the manual). The above rule should
2103 clean-local: my-clean-rule
2105 These *-local targets have been documented since at least
2106 Automake 1.2, so you should not fear the change if you have
2107 to support multiple automake versions.
2111 - The Automake manual is now distributed under the terms of the GNU FDL.
2113 - Targets dist-gzip, dist-bzip2, dist-tarZ, dist-zip are always defined.
2115 - core dumps are no longer removed by the cleaning rules. There are
2116 at least three reasons for this:
2117 1. These files should not be created by any build step,
2118 so their removal do not fit any of the cleaning rules.
2119 Actually, they may be precious to the developer.
2120 2. If such file is created during a build, then it's clearly a
2121 bug Automake should not hide. Not removing the file will
2122 cause `make distcheck' to complain about its presence.
2123 3. Operating systems have different naming conventions for
2124 core dump files. A core file on one system might be a
2125 completely legitimate data file on another system.
2127 - RUNTESTFLAGS, CTAGSFLAGS, ETAGSFLAGS, JAVACFLAGS are no longer
2128 defined by Automake. This means that any definition in the
2129 environment will be used, unless overridden in the Makefile.am or
2130 on the command line. The old behavior, where these variables were
2131 defined empty in each Makefile, can be obtained by AC_SUBSTing or
2132 AC_ARG_VARing each variable from configure.ac.
2134 - CONFIGURE_DEPENDENCIES and CONFIG_STATUS_DEPENDENCIES are now
2135 documented. (The is not a new feature, these variables have
2136 been there since at least Automake 1.4.)
2138 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
2140 Bugs fixed in 1.7.9:
2141 * Fix install-strip to work with nobase_ binaries.
2142 * Fix renaming of #line directives in ylwrap.
2143 * Rebuild with Autoconf 2.59. (1.7.8 was not installable with pdksh.)
2145 Bugs fixed in 1.7.8:
2146 * Remove spurious blank lines in cleaning rules introduced in 1.7.7.
2147 * Fix detection of Debian's install-info, broken since version 1.5.
2148 (Debian bug #213524).
2149 * Honor -module if it appears in AM_LDFLAGS (i.e., relax name checking)
2150 This was only done for libfoo_LDFLAGS and LDFLAGS in previous versions.
2152 Bugs fixed in 1.7.7:
2153 * The implementation of automake's --no-force option is unreliable,
2154 so this option is ignored in this version. A real fix will appear in
2155 Automake 1.8. (Debian Bug #206299)
2156 * AM_PATH_PYTHON: really check the whole list of interpreters if no
2157 argument is given. (PR/399)
2158 * Do not warn about leading `_' in variable names, even with -Wportability.
2159 * Support user redefinitions of TEXINFO_TEX.
2160 * depcomp: support AIX Compiler version 6.
2161 * Fix missing rebuilds during `make dist' with BSD make.
2162 (Could produce tarballs containing out-of-date files.)
2163 * Resurrect multilib support.
2164 * Noteworthy manual updates:
2165 - Extending aclocal: how to write m4 macros that won't trigger warnings
2167 - A Shared Library: Rewrite and split into subsections.
2169 Bugs fixed in 1.7.6:
2170 * Fix depcomp's icc mode for ICC 7.1.
2171 * Diagnose calls to AC_CONFIG_FILES and friends with not enough arguments.
2172 * Fix maintainer-clean's removal of autom4te.cache in VPATH builds.
2173 * Fix AM_PATH_LISPDIR to work with POSIXLY_CORRECT=1.
2174 * Fix the location reported in some diagnostics related to AUTOMAKE_OPTIONS.
2175 * Remove Latin-1 characters from elisp-comp.
2176 * Update the manual's @dircategory to match the Free Software Directory.
2178 Bugs fixed in 1.7.5:
2179 * Update install-sh's license to remove an advertising clause.
2180 (Debian bug #191717)
2181 * Fix a bug introduced in 1.7.4, related to BUILT_SOURCE handling,
2182 that caused invalid Makefile.ins to be generated.
2183 * Make sure AM_MAKE_INCLUDE doesn't fail when a `doit' file exists.
2184 * New FAQ entry: renamed objects.
2186 Bugs fixed in 1.7.4:
2187 * Tweak the TAGS rule to support Exuberant Ctags (in addition to
2188 the Emacs implementation)
2189 * Fix output of aclocal.m4 dependencies in subdirectories.
2190 * Use `mv -f' instead of `mv' in fastdep rules.
2191 * Upgrade mdate-sh to work on OS/2.
2192 * Don't byte-compile elisp files when ELCFILES is set empty.
2193 (this documented feature was broken by 1.7.3)
2194 * Diagnose trailing backslashes on last line of Makefile.am.
2195 * Diagnose whitespace following trailing backslashes.
2196 * Multiple tests are now correctly supported in DEJATOOL. (PR/388)
2197 * Fix rebuilt rules for AC_CONFIG_FILES([Makefile:Makefile.in:Makefile.bot])
2199 * `make install' will build `BUILT_SOURCES' first.
2200 * Minor documentation fixes.
2202 Bugs fixed in 1.7.3:
2203 * Fix stamp files numbering (when using multiple AC_CONFIG_HEADERS).
2204 * Query distutils for `pythondir' and `pythonexecdir', instead of
2205 using an hardcoded path. This should allow builds on 64-bit
2206 distributions that usually use lib64/ instead of lib/.
2207 * AM_PATH_PYTHON will also search for python2.3.
2208 * elisp files are now built all at once instead of one by one. Besides
2209 incurring a speed-up, this is required to support interdependent elisp files.
2210 * Support for DJGPP:
2211 - `make distcheck' will now work in `_inst/' and `_build' instead
2212 of `=inst/' and `=build/'
2213 - use `_dirstamp' when the file-system doesn't support `.dirstamp'
2214 - install/uninstall `*.i[0-9][0-9]'-style info files
2215 - more changes that affect only the Automake package (not its output)
2216 * Fix some incompatibilities with upcoming perl-5.10.
2217 * Properly quote AC_PACKAGE_TARNAME and AC_PACKAGE_VERSION when defining
2218 PACKAGE and VERSION.
2220 - dashmstdout and dashXmstdout modes: don't use `-o /dev/null', this
2221 is troublesome with gcc and Solaris compilers. (PR/385)
2222 - makedepend mode: work with Libtool. (PR/385 too)
2224 * better support for unusual gettext setups, such as multiple po/ directories
2226 - Flag missing po/ and intl/ directories as warnings, not errors.
2227 - Disable these warnings if po/ does not exist.
2228 * Noteworthy manual updates:
2230 - Document how AC_CONFIG_AUX_DIR interacts with missing files.
2232 - Document `AM_YFLAGS = -d'. (PR/382)
2234 Bugs fixed in 1.7.2:
2235 * Fix installation and uninstallation of Info files built in subdirectories.
2236 * Do not run `./configure --with-included-gettext' during `make distcheck'
2237 if AM_GNU_GETTEXT([external]) is used.
2238 * Correctly uninstall renamed man pages.
2239 * Do not strip escaped newline in variables defined in one condition
2240 and augmented in another condition.
2241 * Fix ansi2knr rules for LIBOBJS sources.
2242 * Clean all known Texinfo index files, not only those which appear to
2243 be used, because we cannot know which indexes are used in included files.
2244 (PR/375, Debian Bug #168671)
2245 * Honor only the first @setfilename seen in a Texinfo file.
2246 * Treat "required file X not found" diagnostics as errors (exit status 1).
2247 * Don't complain that a required file is not found when it is a Makefile
2249 * Don't use single suffix inference rules when building `.info'-less
2250 Info files, for the sake of Solaris make.
2251 * The `check' target now depends on `$(BUILT_SOURCES)'. (PR/359)
2252 * Recognize multiple inference rules such as `.a.b .c.d:'. (PR/371)
2253 * Warn about multiple inference rules when -Wportability is used. (PR/372)
2254 * Fix building of deansified files from subdirectories. (PR/370)
2255 * Add missing `fi' in the .c->.obj rules.
2256 * Improve install-sh to work even when names contain spaces or certain
2257 (but not all) shell metachars.
2258 * Fix the following spurious failures in the test suite:
2259 depcomp2.test, gnits2.test, gnits3.test, python3.test, texinfo13.test
2260 * Noteworthy manual updates:
2261 - Augment the section about BUILT_SOURCES.
2262 - Mention that AM_PROG_CC_STDC is a relic that is better avoided today.
2264 Bugs fixed in 1.7.1:
2265 * Honor `ansi2knr' for files built in subdirectories, or using per-targets
2267 * Aclocal should now recognize macro names containing parentheses, e.g.
2268 AC_DEFUN([AC_LANG_PREPROC(Fortran 90)], [...]).
2269 * Erase *.sum and *.log files created by DejaGnu, during `make distclean'.
2271 * Install Python files even if they were built. (PR/369)
2272 * Have stamp-vti dependent upon configure instead of configure.ac, as the
2273 version might not be defined in the latter. (PR/358)
2274 * Reorder arguments passed to a couple of commands, so things works
2275 when POSIXLY_CORRECT=1.
2276 * Fix a regex that can cause Perl to segfault on large input.
2278 * Fix distribution of packages that have some sources defined conditionally,
2279 as in the `Conditional compilation using Automake conditionals' example
2281 * Fix spurious test suite failures on IRIX.
2282 * Don't report a required variable as undefined if it has been
2283 defined conditionally for the "right" conditions.
2284 * Fix cleaning of the /tmp subdirectory used by `make distcheck', in case
2285 `make distcheck' fails.
2286 * Fix distribution of included Makefile fragment, so we don't create
2287 spurious directories in the distribution. (PR/366)
2288 * Don't complain that a target lacks `.$(EXEEXT)' when it has it.
2291 * Autoconf 2.54 is required.
2292 * `aclocal' and `automake' will no longer warn about obsolete
2293 configure macros. This is done by `autoconf -Wobsolete'.
2294 * AM_CONFIG_HEADER, AM_SYS_POSIX_TERMIOS and
2295 AM_HEADER_TIOCGWINSZ_NEEDS_SYS_IOCTL are obsolete (although still
2296 supported). You should use AC_CONFIG_HEADERS, AC_SYS_POSIX_TERMIOS,
2297 and AC_HEADER_TIOCGWINSZ instead. `autoupdate' can upgrade
2298 `configure.ac' for you.
2299 * Support for per-program and per-library `_CPPFLAGS'.
2300 * New `ctags' target (builds CTAGS files).
2301 * Support for -Wmumble and -Wno-mumble, where mumble is a warning category
2302 (see `automake --help' or the manual for a list of them).
2303 * Honor the WARNINGS environment variable.
2304 * Omit the call to depcomp when using gcc3: call the compiler directly.
2305 * A new option, std-options, tests that programs support --help and --version
2306 when `make installcheck' is run. This is enabled by --gnits.
2307 * Texinfo rules now support the `ps' and `pdf' targets.
2308 * Info files are now created in the build directory, not the source directory.
2309 * info_TEXINFOS supports files in subdirectories (this requires Texinfo 4.1
2311 * `make distcheck' will enforce DESTDIR support by attempting
2313 * `+=' can be used in conditionals, even if the augmented variable
2314 was defined for another condition.
2315 * Makefile fragments (inserted with `include') are always distributed.
2316 * Use Autoconf's --trace interface to inspect configure.ac and get
2317 a more accurate view of it.
2318 * Add support for extending aclocal's default macro search path
2319 using a `dirlist' file within the aclocal directory.
2320 * automake --output-dir is deprecated.
2321 * The part of the distcheck target that checks whether uninstall actually
2322 removes all installed files has been moved in a separate target,
2323 distuninstallcheck, so it can be overridden easily.
2327 * Support for AM_INIT_GETTEXT([external])
2328 * Bug fixes, including:
2329 - Fix Automake's own `make install' so it works even if `ln' doesn't.
2330 - nobase_ programs and scripts honor --program-transform correctly.
2331 - Erase configure.lineno during `make distclean'.
2332 - Erase YACC and LEX outputs during `make maintainer-clean'.
2335 * Many bug fixes, including:
2336 - Requiring the current version works.
2337 - Fix "$@" portability issues (for Zsh).
2338 - Fix output of dummy dependency files in presence of post-processed
2340 - Don't compute dependencies in background to avoid races with libtool.
2341 - Fix handling of _OBJECTS variables for targets sharing source variables.
2342 - Check dependency mode for Java when AM_PROG_GCJ is used.
2345 * automake --output-dir is deprecated
2346 * Many bug fixes, including:
2347 - Don't choke on AM_LDFLAGS definitions.
2348 - Clean libtool objects from subdirectories.
2349 - Allow configure variables with reserved suffix and unknown prefix
2350 (e.g. AC_SUBST(mumble_LDFLAGS) when 'mumble' is not a target).
2351 - Fix the definition of AUTOMAKE and ACLOCAL in configure.
2354 * Autoconf 2.52 is required.
2355 * automake no longer run libtoolize.
2356 This is the job of autoreconf (from GNU Autoconf).
2357 * `dist' generates all the archive flavors, as did `dist-all'.
2358 * `dist-gzip' generates the Gzip tar file only.
2359 * Combining Automake Makefile conditionals no longer lead to a combinatorial
2360 explosion. Makefile.in's keep a reasonable size.
2361 * AM_FUNC_ERROR_AT_LINE, AM_FUNC_STRTOD, AM_FUNC_OBSTACK, AM_PTRDIFF_T
2362 are no longer shipped, since Autoconf 2.52 provides them (both as AM_
2364 * `#line' of Lex and Yacc files are properly set.
2365 * EXTRA_DIST can contain generated directories.
2366 * Support for dot-less extensions in suffix rules.
2367 * The part of the distcheck target that checks whether distclean actually
2368 cleans all built files has been moved in a separate target, distcleancheck,
2369 so it can be overridden easily.
2370 * `make distcheck' will pass additional options defined in
2371 $(DISTCHECK_CONFIGURE_FLAGS) to configure.
2372 * Fixed CDPATH portability problems, in particular for MacOS X.
2373 * Fixed handling of nobase_ targets.
2374 * Fixed support of implicit rules leading to .lo objects.
2375 * Fixed late inclusion of --add-missing files (e.g. depcomp) in DIST_COMMON
2376 * Added uninstall-hook target
2377 * `AC_INIT AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE(tarname,version)' is an obsolete construct.
2378 You can now use `AC_INIT(pkgname,version) AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE' instead.
2379 (Note that "pkgname" is not "tarname", see the manual for details.)
2380 It is also possible to pass a list of global Automake options as
2381 first argument to this new form of AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE.
2382 * Compiler-based assembler is now called `CCAS'; people expected `AS'
2383 to be a real assembler.
2384 * AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE will set STRIP itself when it needs it. Adding
2385 AC_CHECK_TOOL([STRIP], [strip]) manually is no longer required.
2386 * aclocal and automake are also installed with the version number
2387 appended, and some of the install directory names have changed.
2388 This lets you have multiple versions installed simultaneously.
2389 * Support for parsers and lexers in subdirectories.
2392 * Support for `configure.ac'.
2393 * Support for `else COND', `endif COND' and negated conditions `!COND'.
2394 * `make dist-all' is much faster.
2395 * Allows '@' AC_SUBSTs in macro names.
2396 * Faster AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE (requires update of `missing' script)
2397 * User-side dependency tracking. Developers no longer need GNU make
2399 * Uses DIST_SUBDIRS in some situations when SUBDIRS is conditional
2400 * Most files are correctly handled if they appear in subdirs
2401 For instance, a _DATA file can appear in a subdir
2402 * GNU tar is no longer required for `make dist'
2403 * Added support for `dist_' and `nodist_' prefixes
2404 * Added support for `nobase_' prefix
2405 * Compiled Java support
2406 * Support for per-executable and per-library compilation flags
2410 * Added support for the Fortran 77 programming language.
2411 * Re-indexed the Automake Texinfo manual.
2412 * Added `AM_FOOFLAGS' variable for each compiler invocation;
2413 e.g. AM_CFLAGS can be used in Makefile.am to set C compiler flags
2414 * Support for latest autoconf, including support for objext
2415 * Can now put `.' in SUBDIRS to control build order
2416 * `include' command and `+=' support for macro assignment
2417 * Dependency tracking no long susceptible to deleted header file problem
2418 * Maintainer mode now a conditional. @MAINT@ is now an anachronism.
2423 * Better Cygwin32 support
2424 * Support for suffix rules with _SOURCES variables
2425 * New options `readme-alpha' and `check-news'; Gnits mode sets these
2426 * @LEXLIB@ no longer required when lex source seen
2427 Lex support in `missing', and new lex macro. Update your missing script.
2428 * Built-in support for assembly
2429 * aclocal gives error if `AM_' macro not found
2430 * Passed YFLAGS, not YACCFLAGS, to yacc
2431 * AM_PROG_CC_STDC does not have to come before AC_PROG_CPP
2432 * Dependencies computed as a side effect of compilation
2433 * Preliminary support for Java
2434 * DESTDIR support at "make install" time
2435 * Improved ansi2knr support; you must use the latest ansi2knr.c (included)
2439 * Better DejaGnu support
2440 * Added no-installinfo option
2441 * Added Emacs Lisp support
2442 * Added --no-force option
2443 * Included `aclocal' program
2444 * Automake will now generate rules to regenerate aclocal.m4, if appropriate
2445 * Now uses `AM_' macro names everywhere
2446 * ansi2knr option can have directory prefix (eg `../lib/ansi2knr')
2447 ansi2knr now works correctly on K&R sources
2448 * Better C++, yacc, lex support
2449 * Will compute _DEPENDENCIES variables automatically if not supplied
2450 * Will interpolate $(...) and ${...} when examining contents of a variable
2451 * .deps files now in build directory, not source directory; dependency
2452 handling generally rewritten
2453 * DATA, MANS and BUILT_SOURCES no longer included in distribution
2454 * can now put config.h into a subdir
2455 * Added dist-all target
2456 * Support for install-info program (see texinfo 3.9)
2457 * Support for "yacc -d"
2458 * configure substitutions are automatically discovered and included
2459 in generated Makefile.in
2460 * Special --cygnus mode
2461 * OMIT_DEPENDENCIES can now hold list of dependencies to be omitted
2462 when making distribution. Some dependencies are auto-ignored.
2463 * Changed how libraries are specified in _LIBRARIES variable
2464 * Full libtool support, from Gord Matzigkeit
2465 * No longer have to explicitly touch stamp-h when using AC_CONFIG_HEADER;
2466 AM_CONFIG_HEADER handles it automatically
2467 * Texinfo output files no longer need .info extension
2468 * Added `missing' support
2470 * Conditionals in Makefile.am, from Ian Taylor
2474 * distcheck target runs install and installcheck targets
2475 * Added preliminary support for DejaGnu.
2480 * More libtool fixes from Gord Matzigkeit; libtool support is still
2482 * Added support for jm_MAINTAINER_MODE
2484 * New "distcheck" target
2488 * mkinstalldirs and mdate-sh now appear in directory specified by
2490 * Removed DIST_SUBDIRS, DIST_OTHER
2491 * AC_ARG_PROGRAM only required when an actual program exists
2492 * dist-hook target now run before distribution packaged up; idea from
2493 Dieter Baron. Other hooks exist, too.
2494 * Preliminary (unfinished) support for libtool
2495 * Added short option names.
2496 * Better "dist" support when gluing together multiple packages
2500 * Documentation updates (many from François Pinard)
2501 * strictness `normal' now renamed to `foreign'
2502 * Renamed --install-missing to --add-missing
2503 * Now handles AC_CONFIG_AUX_DIR
2504 * Now handles TESTS macro
2505 * DIST_OTHER renamed to EXTRA_DIST
2506 * DIST_SUBDIRS is deprecated
2507 * @ALLOCA@ and @LIBOBJS@ now work in _LDADD variables
2508 * Better error messages in many cases
2509 * Program names are canonicalized
2510 * Added "check" prefix; from Gord Matzigkeit
2514 * configure.in scanner knows about AC_PATH_XTRA, AC_OUTPUT ":" syntax
2515 * Beginnings of a test suite
2516 * Automatically adds -I options for $(srcdir), ".", and path to config.h
2517 * Doesn't print anything when running
2518 * Beginnings of MAINT_CHARSET support
2519 * Can specify version in AUTOMAKE_OPTIONS
2520 * Most errors recognizable by Emacs' M-x next-error
2521 * Added --verbose option
2522 * All "primary" variables now obsolete; use EXTRA_PRIMARY to supply
2523 configure-generated names
2524 * Required macros now distributed in aclocal.m4
2526 * --strictness=gnu is default
2530 * More sophisticated configure.in scanning; now understands ALLOCA and
2531 LIBOBJS directly, handles AC_CONFIG_HEADER more precisely, etc.
2532 * TEXINFOS and MANS now obsolete; use info_TEXINFOS and man_MANS instead.
2533 * CONFIG_HEADER variable now obsolete
2534 * Can handle multiple Texinfo sources
2535 * Allow hierarchies deeper than 2. From Gord Matzigkeit.
2536 * HEADERS variable no longer needed; now can put .h files directly into
2537 foo_SOURCES variable.
2538 * Automake automatically rebuilds files listed in AC_OUTPUT. The
2539 corresponding ".in" files are included in the distribution.
2542 * Added --gnu and --gnits options
2543 * More standards checking
2545 * Cleaned up 'dist' targets
2546 * Added AUTOMAKE_OPTIONS variable and several options
2547 * Now scans configure.in to get some information (preliminary)
2550 * Works with Perl 4 again
2553 * Added --install-missing option.
2554 * Pretty-prints generated macros and rules
2555 * Comments in Makefile.am are placed more intelligently in Makefile.in
2556 * Generates .PHONY target
2557 * Rule or macro in Makefile.am now overrides contents of Automake file
2558 * Substantial cleanups from François Pinard
2562 * Works with Perl 4 again.
2565 * New uniform naming scheme.
2566 * --strictness option
2568 * '.c' files corresponding to '.y' or '.l' files are automatically
2570 * Many bug fixes and cleanups
2573 * Allow objects to be conditionally included in libraries via lib_LIBADD.
2576 * Bug fixes in 'clean' code.
2577 * Now generates 'installdirs' target.
2578 * man page installation reworked.
2579 * 'make dist' no longer re-creates all Makefile.in's.
2582 * Reimplemented in Perl
2583 * Added --amdir option (for debugging)
2584 * Texinfo support cleaned up.
2585 * Automatic de-ANSI-fication cleaned up.
2586 * Cleaned up 'clean' targets.
2589 * Automatic dependency tracking
2590 * More documentation
2591 * New variables DATA and PACKAGEDATA
2592 * SCRIPTS installed using $(INSTALL_SCRIPT)
2593 * No longer uses double-colon rules
2595 * Changes in advance of internationalization
2599 Copyright (C) 1995-2013 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
2601 This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
2602 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
2603 the Free Software Foundation; either version 2, or (at your option)
2606 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
2607 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
2608 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
2609 GNU General Public License for more details.
2611 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
2612 along with this program. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
projects / platform / upstream / automake.git / blob