Re: automake 'dist' target distributes built source file

[Stepan Kasal]

Hello,
  let me take this opportunity to wrestle with a myth:

On Sat, Jul 22, 2006 at 07:19:31PM +0200, Bruno Haible wrote:
> automake-1.9.6 insists on distributing a file, although I have
...
>   - listed it in BUILT_SOURCES and in CLEANFILES.

We all know what CLEANFILES means, and it sounds reasonable that if a
file is listed there, it should not be distributed.
(Unfortunately, Automake cannot get this informations directly, but
the consistency is checked by ``make distcheck''.)

But please note that BUILT_SOURCES is a very special variable:
listing a target there means that it will be built at the very
begining of targets `all', `check', and `install', but that is all.
It is just a hack which helps in situations where the target cannot
be listed as a prerequisite to the terget which really needs it.

Hope this makes this corner less dark,
        Stepan Kasal