Re: Autotools lint tool

[Bob Friesenhahn]

On Sun, 6 Oct 2019, Richard Ash wrote:

> On Thu, 3 Oct 2019 17:06:18 -0500 (CDT)
> Bob Friesenhahn <address@hidden> wrote:
> > Many existing common tests found in Autoconf scripts can just be
> > removed since standards have made them unnecessary.
>
> At the risk of being contrary, this is one of the things which a
> "linter" for autotools should be able to tell the user (it may need to
> make an assumption about the target OS list of course, just as you
> have)!

Unless the test is done via a standard macro (e.g. testing for a 
well-known function), it would be very difficult for automated 
analysis to intuit what the shell script code is trying to do.

Project maintainers should check configure script output for tests 
which made sense 20 years ago but are now no longer needed.  Usually 
source code changes are warranted due to removing a test.

Standardization of interfaces has proven to be a success.  However, 
new interfaces are continually added and many of them are not part of 
a published standard or on a track to become one.

Bob
--
Bob Friesenhahn
address@hidden, http://www.simplesystems.org/users/bfriesen/
GraphicsMagick Maintainer,    http://www.GraphicsMagick.org/
Public Key,     http://www.simplesystems.org/users/bfriesen/public-key.txt