Re: AC_DEFINE_UNQUOTED doc update

[Stepan Kasal]

Hi,

On Fri, Apr 29, 2005 at 05:53:40PM +0200, Ralf Wildenhues wrote:
> > I think we should tell them at some stage, it can save them some typing.
> 
> Is saving on typing the only reason?  Let's use short, unreadable
> variable names!  :->
> 
> No, seriously, for one bugreport less I'd happily type lots of quotes.

*You* would perhaps type the quotes happily; but we are talking about
saving *their* typing.  Every Autoconf user would have to type more [ ]
if we don't tell him about the trick.   ;-)

> My editor also makes reading them easy, YMMV though.

<flame>
Files should be easily readable as they are, without special tools to display
them.  That's why I love text config files, and why I don't think XML is the
best for human-written files.
</flame>

> A definition (if possible) would be nice.  This is a guess of mine:
> 
> Simple text is text composed of the characters isprint(3) recognizes,
> but not including brackets, comma, dollar, and words that constitute
> defined macro names, m4 commands.  Within pure Autoconf we guarantee
> macros to be all uppercase matching
>   _?A[CST]_.*
> and m4 commands all match
>   m4_.*
> in regex(7) notation.

No, there are 27 m4 builtins which are also available without the m4_
prefix.  See ./lib/autoconf/autoconf.m4 in the autoconf source.

> > Shall we teach the users to quote all shell code which is outside of any
> > macros?  I don't think so.
> 
> I tend to disagree slightly here.

You mean:

[if test "x$with_zlib" != xno; then
        with_zlib=no]
        AC_CHECK_HEADER(zlib.h, [AC_CHECK_LIB(z, gzread, [with_zlib=yes])])
[fi
if test "$with_zlib" = no; then]
        AC_MSG_ERROR([*** zlib is required])
[fi]

I think it wouldn't be nice to do this to our beloved users.

Life ain't easy.  Even computers are not able to make it so.  ;-)

Have a nice day,
        Stepan