= autotools.txt =

After checking out this directory, both of the following SHOULD work:

(1) for users:
  ./configure whatever_options
  make

(2) for developers changing Makefile.am and configure.ac

  autoreconf
  ./configure whatever_options
  make

for which you need autotools (version requirement?).

autoreconf generates (among others) Makefile.in from Makefile.am
and configure from configure.ac, but in order to avoid hassling 
ordinary users, files generated by autoreconf are also committed
into the repository, so (1) SHOULD just work.

Currently, however, even if you follow the path (1), make may start
regenerating Makefile.in from Makefile.am using automake, which will
fail in environments that lack it.

This happens because the automatically generated Makefile describe
dependencies:

  Makefile.in : some files

and, after you check out from the repository, there is no guarantee
Makefile.in happens to be newer than those prerequisites.

To avoid this, you can simply 

   touch Makefile.in

right after you check out.

I don't know if there is a smarter way to avoid this...


= info about autotools.txt =

As far as I could found
http://www.lrde.epita.fr/~adl/dl/autotools-handout-4.pdf
(available from http://www.lrde.epita.fr/~adl/autotools.html )
is the best tutorial about GNU autotools.

