maint: modernize README-{hacking,prereq}

1 files changed, 21 insertions, 44 deletions

diff --git a/README-prereq b/README-prereq
index 267d0ee9..4cc09eba 100644
--- a/README-prereq
+++ b/README-prereq
@@ -1,63 +1,40 @@
 This gives some notes on obtaining the tools required for development.
-I.E. the tools checked for by the bootstrap script and include:
+These tools can be used by the 'bootstrap' and 'configure' scripts,
+as well as by 'make'.  They include:
 
 - Autoconf   <https://www.gnu.org/software/autoconf/>
 - Automake   <https://www.gnu.org/software/automake/>
-- Bison      <https://www.gnu.org/software/bison/>
 - Gettext    <https://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/>
 - Git        <https://git-scm.com/>
-- Gperf      <https://www.gnu.org/software/gperf/>
 - Gzip       <https://www.gnu.org/software/gzip/>
+- Help2man   <https://www.gnu.org/software/help2man/>
+- M4         <https://www.gnu.org/software/m4/>
+- Make       <https://www.gnu.org/software/make/>
 - Perl       <https://www.cpan.org/>
 - Pkg-config <https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/pkg-config/>
-- Rsync      <https://rsync.samba.org/>
 - Tar        <https://www.gnu.org/software/tar/>
 - Texinfo    <https://www.gnu.org/software/texinfo/>
+- Wget       <http://www.gnu.org/software/wget/>
 - XZ Utils   <https://tukaani.org/xz/>
 
-Note please try to install/build official packages for your system.
-If these programs are not available use the following instructions
-to build them and install the results into a directory that you will
-then use when building this package.
+It is generally better to use official packages for your system.
+If a package is not officially available you can build it from source
+and install it into a directory that you can then use to build this
+package.  If some packages are available but are too old, install the
+too-old versions first as they may be needed to build newer versions.
 
-Even if the official version of a package for your system is too old,
-please install it, as it may be required to build the newer versions.
-The examples below install into $HOME/grep/deps/, so if you are
-going to follow these instructions, first ensure that your $PATH is
-set correctly by running this command:
+Here is an example of how to build a program from source.  This
+example is for Autoconf; a similar approach should work for the other
+developer prerequisites.  This example assumes Autoconf 2.71; it
+should be OK to use a later version of Autoconf, if available.
 
-  prefix=$HOME/grep/deps
+  prefix=$HOME/prefix   # (or wherever else you choose)
   export PATH=$prefix/bin:$PATH
-
-* autoconf *
-
-  # Note Autoconf 2.62 or newer is needed to build automake-1.11.1
-  git clone --depth=1 git://git.sv.gnu.org/autoconf.git
-  git checkout v2.62
-  autoreconf -vi
-  ./configure --prefix=$prefix
-  make install
-
-* automake *
-
-  # Note help2man is required to build automake fully
-  git clone git://git.sv.gnu.org/automake.git
-  cd automake
-  git checkout v1.11.1
-  ./bootstrap
-  ./configure --prefix=$prefix
-  make install
-
-This package uses XZ utils (successor to LZMA) to create
-a compressed distribution tarball.  Using this feature of Automake
-requires version 1.10a or newer, as well as the xz program itself.
-
-* xz *
-
-  git clone git://ctrl.tukaani.org/xz.git
-  cd xz
-  ./autogen.sh
+  wget https://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/autoconf/autoconf-2.71.tar.gz
+  gzip -d <autoconf-2.71.tar.gz | tar xf -
+  cd autoconf-2.71
   ./configure --prefix=$prefix
   make install
 
-Now you can build this package as described in README-hacking.
+Once the prerequisites are installed, you can build this package as
+described in README-hacking.