Re: [RFC PATCH]: autom4te: report subsecond timestamp support in --version

[Zack Weinberg]

On Mon, Dec 4, 2023, at 7:26 PM, Jacob Bachmeyer wrote:
> Now that I have seen the actual patch, yes, this test should be
> accurate.  The test in the main autom4te script will also work, even
> if there is a mismatch between the script and its library

Good.

> This appears to be misaligned with the GNU Coding Standards, which
> states:  "The first line is meant to be easy for a program to parse;
> the version number proper starts after the last space."
>
> Perhaps the best option would be to conditionally add a line "This
> autom4te supports subsecond timestamps." after the license notice?

I don't like putting anything after the license notice because it's
convenient to be able to pipe --version output to sed '/Copyright/,$d'
without losing anything relevant for troubleshooting.  So how about

$ autom4te --version
autom4te (GNU Autoconf) 2.71
Features: subsecond-timestamps

Copyright (C) 2021 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
License GPLv3+/Autoconf: GNU GPL version 3 or later
<https://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>, <https://gnu.org/licenses/exceptions.html>
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.

Written by Akim Demaille.

This preserves the effectiveness of sed '/Copyright/,$d' and also
leaves room for future additions to the "Features:" line.

zw