diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'NEWS')
| -rw-r--r-- | NEWS | 232 |
1 files changed, 193 insertions, 39 deletions
@@ -1,23 +1,24 @@ * WARNING: New versioning scheme for Automake. - - Starting with this version onward, Automake will use an update and - more rational versioning scheme, one that will allow users to know - which kind of changes can be expected from a new version, based on - its version number. - - + Micro versions (e.g., 1.13.3, 2.0.1, 3.2.8) will introduce only - documentation updates and bug and regression fixes; they will - not introduce new features, nor any backward-incompatibility (any + - Beginning with the release 1.13.2, Automake has started to use a + more rational versioning scheme, that should allow users to know + which kind of changes can be expected from a new version, based + on its version number. + + + Micro releases (e.g., 1.13.3, 2.0.1, 3.2.8) introduce only bug + and regression fixes and documentation updates; they should not + introduce new features, nor any backward-incompatibility (any such incompatibility would be considered a bug, to be fixed with a further micro release). - + Minor versions (e.g., 1.14, 2.1) can introduce new backward + + Minor releases (e.g., 1.14, 2.1) can introduce new backward compatible features; the only backward-incompatibilities allowed in such a release are new *non-fatal* deprecations and warnings, and possibly fixes for old or non-trivial bugs (or even inefficient - behaviours) that could unfortunately have been seen, and used, by - some developers as "corner case features". Possible disruptions - caused by this kind of fixes should hopefully be quite rare. + behaviours) that could unfortunately have been seen and used by + some as "corner case features". Possible disruptions caused by + this kind of fixes should hopefully be quite rare, and their + effects limited in scope. + Major versions (now expected to be released every 18 or 24 months, and not more often) can introduce new big features (possibly with @@ -29,26 +30,36 @@ should be duly implemented in the preceding minor releases. - According to this new scheme, the next major version of Automake - (the one that has until now been labelled as '1.14') will actually - become "Automake 2.0". Automake 1.14 will be the next minor version, - which will introduce new features, deprecations and bug fixes, but - no serious backward incompatibility. + (the one that had previously been labelled as "1.14") will actually + become "Automake 2.0". Automake 1.14 is *this* release (which is + a minor one). It introduces new features, deprecations and bug + fixes, but no serious backward incompatibility. A partial exception + is given by the behavioural changes in the AM_PROG_CC_C_O macro + (described in details below) but such changes can also be seen as a + fix for the old suboptimal and somewhat confusing behaviour. - See discussion about automake bug#13578 for more details and background: <http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=13578> +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + * WARNING: Future backward-incompatibilities! - Makefile recipes generated by Automake 2.0 will expect to use an 'rm' program that doesn't complain when called without any non-option argument if the '-f' option is given (so that commands like "rm -f" and "rm -rf" will act as a no-op, instead of raising usage errors). - Accordingly, AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE will expand new shell code checking - that the default 'rm' program in PATH satisfies this requirement, and - aborting the configure process if this is not the case. This behavior - of 'rm' is very widespread in the wild, and it will be required in the - next POSIX version: - <http://austingroupbugs.net/view.php?id=542> + This behavior of 'rm' is very widespread in the wild, and it will be + required in the next POSIX version: + + <http://austingroupbugs.net/view.php?id=542> + + Accordingly, AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE now expands some shell code that checks + that the default 'rm' program in PATH satisfies this requirement, + aborting the configure process if this is not the case. For the + moment, it's still possible to force the configuration process to + succeed even with a broken 'rm', that that will no longer be the case + for Automake 2.0. - Automake 2.0 will require Autoconf 2.70 or later (which is still unreleased at the moment of writing, but is planned to be released @@ -58,11 +69,12 @@ name for the Autoconf input file. You are advised to start using the recommended name 'configure.ac' instead, ASAP. - - The ACLOCAL_AMFLAGS special make variable will be fully deprecated - in Automake 2.0 (where it will raise warnings in the "obsolete" - category). You are advised to start relying on the new Automake - support for AC_CONFIG_MACRO_DIRS instead (which was introduced in - Automake 1.13). + - The ACLOCAL_AMFLAGS special make variable will be fully deprecated in + Automake 2.0: it will raise warnings in the "obsolete" category (but + still no hard error of course, for compatibilities with the many, many + packages that still relies on that variable). You are advised to + start relying on the new Automake support for AC_CONFIG_MACRO_DIRS + instead (which was introduced in Automake 1.13). - Automake 2.0 will remove support for automatic dependency tracking with the SGI C/C++ compilers on IRIX. The SGI depmode has been @@ -78,7 +90,11 @@ versions will continue to be fully supported. - Automake-provided scripts and makefile recipes might (finally!) - start assuming a POSIX shell in Automake 2.0. + start assuming a POSIX shell in Automake 2.0. There still is no + certainty about this though: we'd first like to wait and see + whether future Autoconf versions will be enhanced to guarantee + that such a shell is always found and provided by the checks in + ./configure. - Starting from Automake 2.0, third-party m4 files located in the system-wide aclocal directory, as well as in any directory listed @@ -91,6 +107,136 @@ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ +New in 1.14: + +* C compilation, and the AC_PROG_CC and AM_PROG_CC_C_O macros: + + - The 'compile' script is now unconditionally required for all packages + that perform C compilation (if you are using the '--add-missing' + option, automake will fetch that script for you, so you shouldn't + need any explicit adjustment). This new behaviour is needed to avoid + obscure errors when the 'subdir-objects' option is used, and the + compiler is an inferior one that doesn't grasp the combined use of + both the "-c -o" options; see discussion about automake bug#13378 for + more details: + <http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=13378#35> + <http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=13378#44> + + - The next major Automake version (2.0) will unconditionally activate + the 'subdir-objects' option. In order to smooth out the transition, + we now give a warning (in the category 'unsupported') whenever a + source file is present in a subdirectory but the 'subdir-object' is + not enabled. For example, the following usage will trigger such a + warning: + + bin_PROGRAMS = sub/foo + sub_foo_SOURCES = sub/main.c sub/bar.c + + - Automake will automatically enhance the autoconf-provided macro + AC_PROG_CC to force it to check, at configure time, that the + C compiler supports the combined use of both the '-c' and '-o' + options. The result of this check is saved in the cache variable + 'am_cv_prog_cc_c_o', and said result can be overridden by + pre-defining that variable. + + - The AM_PROG_CC_C_O macro can still be called, albeit that should no + longer be necessary. This macro is now just a thin wrapper around the + Automake-enhanced AC_PROG_CC. This means, among the other things, + that its behaviour is changed in three ways: + + 1. It no longer invokes the Autoconf-provided AC_PROG_CC_C_O + macro behind the scenes. + + 2. It caches the check result in the 'am_cv_prog_cc_c_o' variable, + and not in a 'ac_cv_prog_cc_*_c_o' variable whose exact name is + dynamically computed only at configure runtime (really!) from + the content of the '$CC' variable. + + 3. It no longer automatically AC_DEFINE the C preprocessor + symbol 'NO_MINUS_C_MINUS_O'. + +* Texinfo support: + + - Automake can now be instructed to place '.info' files generated from + Texinfo input in the builddir rather than in the srcdir; this is done + specifying the new automake option 'info-in-builddir'. This feature + was requested by the developers of GCC, GDB, GNU binutils and the GNU + bfd library. See the extensive discussion about automake bug#11034 + for more details. + + - For quite a long time, Automake has been implementing an undocumented + hack which ensured that '.info' files which appeared to be cleaned + (by being listed in the CLEANFILES or DISTCLEANFILES variables) were + built in the builddir rather than in the srcdir; this hack was + introduced to ensure better backward-compatibility with package + such as Texinfo, which do things like: + + info_TEXINFOS = texinfo.txi info-stnd.texi info.texi + DISTCLEANFILES = texinfo texinfo-* info*.info* + # Do not create info files for distribution. + dist-info: + @: + + in order not to distribute generated '.info' files. + + Now that we have the 'info-in-builddir' option that explicitly causes + generated '.info' files to be placed in the builddir, this hack should + be longer necessary, so we deprecate it with runtime warnings. It will + likely be removed altogether in Automake 2.0. + +* Relative directory in Makefile fragments: + + - The special Automake-time substitutions '%reldir%' and '%canon_reldir%' + (and their short versions, '%D%' and '%C%' respectively) can now be used + in an included Makefile fragment. The former is substituted with the + relative directory of the included fragment (compared to the top-level + including Makefile), and the latter with the canonicalized version of + the same relative directory. + + # in 'Makefile.am': + bin_PROGRAMS = # will be updated by included Makefile fragments + include src/Makefile.inc + + # in 'src/Makefile.inc': + bin_PROGRAMS += %reldir%/foo + %canon_reldir%_foo_SOURCES = %reldir%/bar.c + + This should be especially useful for packages using a non-recursive + build system. + +* Deprecated distribution formats: + + - The 'shar' and 'compress' distribution formats are deprecated, and + scheduled for removal in Automake 2.0. Accordingly, the use of the + 'dist-shar' and 'dist-tarZ' will cause warnings at automake runtime + (in the 'obsolete' category), and the recipes of the Automake-generated + targets 'dist-shar' and 'dist-tarZ' will unconditionally display + (non-fatal) warnings at make runtime. + +* New configure runtime warnings about "rm -f" support: + + - To simplify transition to Automake 2.0, the shell code expanded by + AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE now checks (at configure runtime) that the default + 'rm' program in PATH doesn't complain when called without any + non-option argument if the '-f' option is given (so that commands like + "rm -f" and "rm -rf" act as a no-op, instead of raising usage errors). + If this is not the case, the configure script is aborted, to call the + attention of the user on the issue, and invite him to fix his PATH. + The checked 'rm' behavior is very widespread in the wild, and will be + required by future POSIX versions: + + <http://austingroupbugs.net/view.php?id=542> + + The user can still force the configure process to complete even in the + presence of a broken 'rm' by defining the ACCEPT_INFERIOR_RM_PROGRAM + environment variable to "yes". And the generated Makefiles should + still work correctly even when such broken 'rm' is used. But note + that this will no longer be the case with Automake 2.0 though, so, if + you encounter the warning, please report it to us ASAP (and try to fix + your environment as well). + +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + New in 1.13.4: * Bugs fixed: @@ -154,17 +300,6 @@ New in 1.13.3: New in 1.13.2: -* Obsolescent features: - - - Use of suffix-less info files (that can be specified through the - '@setfilename' macro in Texinfo input files) is discouraged, and - its use will raise warnings in the 'obsolete' category. - - - Use of Texinfo input files with '.txi' or '.texinfo' extensions - is discouraged, and its use will raise warnings in the 'obsolete' - category. You are advised to simply use the '.texi' extension - instead. - * Documentation fixes: - The long-deprecated but still supported two-arguments invocation form @@ -189,6 +324,25 @@ New in 1.13.2: - Other minor miscellaneous fixes and improvements; in particular, some improvements in cross-references. +* Obsolescent features: + + - Use of suffix-less info files (that can be specified through the + '@setfilename' macro in Texinfo input files) is discouraged, and + its use will raise warnings in the 'obsolete' category. Simply + use the '.info' extension for all your info files, transforming + usages like: + + @setfilename myprogram + + into: + + @setfilename myprogram.info + + - Use of Texinfo input files with '.txi' or '.texinfo' extensions + is discouraged, and its use will raise warnings in the 'obsolete' + category. You are advised to simply use the '.texi' extension + instead. + * Bugs fixed: - When the 'ustar' option is used, the generated configure script no |