Re: [Libguestfs] [PATCH libnbd v2] README: Document additional packages
On Mon, Apr 17, 2023 at 07:29:04PM +0200, Laszlo Ersek wrote:
>
> ## Building from source
>
> +Building from source requires additional packages. On rpm based system
> +use:
Either "On an rpm based system use" or "On rpm based systems use"
sounds better
[2]
"Required for building from git, optional for building from tarballs:"
I *think* autoconf is only needed for the "autoreconf" step, which is
specific to building from git; it is presumably not needed for building
from a tarball.
I believe the same applies to automake. I've checked latest tarball
<https://download.libguestfs.org/libnbd/1.15-development/libnbd-1.15.13.ta...>;
it contains both "Makefile.am" files and "Makefile.in" files.
According
to the comments in the "Makefile.in" files, automake generates
Makefile.in from Makefile.am, and "Makefile.in" is the input file for
./configure. So I think at least in theory we could technically drop the
"Makefile.am" files from the tarball. Either way, automake should only
be necessary when building from a git checkout, not when building from a
tarball.
I guess (?) libtool is required in both cases though.
The intent of the GNU folks is that the three autotools (autoconf,
automake, and libtool) are developer-only (they all require perl and
GNU m4, things that aren't necessarily available on non-developer
machines), and therefore 'make dist' packages enough of their output
into the tarball that you do not have to have any of those tools
available to build the tarball.
I'm not familiar with autotools internals, so I can't say anything
definitive here; I guess I'd propose putting autoconf and automake under
[2], and libtool under [1]. Rich, Eric?
Libtool should also be in [2]; if it has shifted into [1], that's a
bug that should reported to the upstream libtool folks.
Again, sorry that I didn't think this through under v1 already.
Laszlo
--
Eric Blake, Principal Software Engineer
Red Hat, Inc. +1-919-301-3266
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