Re: Cross compiling PARI/what about autoconf?

[Bill Allombert <Bill.Allombert@math.u-bordeaux1.fr>]

On Wed, Sep 03, 2008 at 10:39:13PM +0200, Jeroen Demeyer wrote:
> Bill Allombert wrote:
> >Using autoconf would not address any issue at all, because autoconf is
> >essentially a languqge to build configure script, and know nothing
> >about compiling, buidling libraries, etc.
> 
> Yes, but you can autoconf together with automake (which is what I had in 
> mind).

Automake only know how to generate Makefile. It know nothing about
compiler options and buidling libraries either. And that would make one
more tool to install.

> >and would create lot of issue
> >for people that build from SVN (they would need the same version of
> >autoconf).
> 
> That's absolutely not true.  That's like saying that people need the 
> same version of GCC or GMP.  They will surely need a sufficiently recent 
> version, but there is no need to use exactly the same version.  If you 
> don't want to assume that people have autoconf, you can even put the 
> configure script in SVN.

You do not need the same version of gcc because we follow the C89
standard and each time PARI fails to build with gcc 2.95, I fix it.
You do not need the same version of GNU MP because GMP developpers are
very careful not to break the API and the ABI of GMP.

On the other hand there are about 3 version of autoconf and 4 versions
of automake with incompatible languages in current use.

Cheers,
Bill.