On Wed, 25 May 2011, Eric Blake wrote:
Autoconf stated goal is to generate configure scripts that run on all platforms that comply with the GCS set of minimum prerequisites - it so happens that this covers most Unix'es (including proprietary systems). But right now, the GCS lists diff as a pre-installed minimum prerequisite, so your busybox is NOT in the set of most Unix'es that support autoconf scripts out of the box. Either GCS is too strict, and should be relaxed, or your busybox setup should start providing diff, or both. But since busybox is open source, my guess is that rms will be
Is 'cmp' included in the GCS minimum prerequisites? Just because a program is included in the GCS does not mean that Autoconf is required to make use of it. It seems wise to always use the most simple and most common utility to perform the necessary task. Diff is relatively large and complex as compared with 'cmp' (6 times larger binary). Diff does have the advantage that it knows how to compare text files which might differ in the subtle ways that text files can, while otherwise being the same.
somewhat reluctant to change GCS to remove the diff prerequisite, and instead request that busybox come up to par with the rest of the Unix world by providing diff as a prerequisite.
The purpose of BusyBox is to work in severly contrained environments by leaving large code (like 'diff') out. It is not normally an environment I would want to run Autoconf in (but it is a useful edge case). The user may not have a choice. In fact GNU tools like 'bash' are as large as a BusyBox with almost all the features enabled (BusyBox includes a trimmed-down version of 'ash').
Bob -- Bob Friesenhahn bfriesen@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, http://www.simplesystems.org/users/bfriesen/ GraphicsMagick Maintainer, http://www.GraphicsMagick.org/ _______________________________________________ Autoconf mailing list Autoconf@xxxxxxx https://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/autoconf
