bug#9026: [PATCH] aclocal: handle ACLOCAL_PATH environment variable

[Stefano Lattarini]

On Monday 19 September 2011, Paolo Bonzini wrote:
> On Mon, Sep 19, 2011 at 18:39, Stefano Lattarini
> <address@hidden> wrote:
> >> Just to be sure, you are not including
> >> http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/automake-patches/2010-11/msg00091.html
> >> are you?
> >>
> > No, not yet at least.
> >
> > Because, if I'm not reading it wrong (which I might be doing in fact, since
> > I've only taken a perfunctory look at it so far), it introduces an
> > incompatibility between the "system acdirs" added with ACLOCAL_PATH (which
> > can be used to override automake macros) and those added with dirlist
> > (which on the contrary cannot be used to do so).
> 
> Yes (and that's on purpose: ACLOCAL_PATH is typically used by a user
> which has newer versions of libraries installed, so they need their
> directories to override everything).
>
Yes, this might be desirable.  But then, for consistency sake, shouldn't
we allow the .m4 files in the default system acdir and in the directories
added through a `dirlist' file to override the automake macros as well?
I'm not sure about this, it has its pros and cons...  Anyway, if we decide
to go down this road, we should wait for 1.12, as the introduction of such
a backward-incompatibility, albeit limited, is inappropriate for a minor
release such as 1.11.2.

> Unfortunately, I do not have time right now to look at autotools. :(
> 
No problem, implmeneting the new behaviour(s) shoul be pretty easy; the
only tricky thing is to decide which new behaviours we want exactly, and
this is where I'm asking for feedback.

Thanks,
  Stefano