Re: coreutils-4.5.1 and gettext-0.11.5 incompatibility on DEC Alpha GNU/Linux (Red Hat 6.2)

[Bruno Haible]

Nelson H. F. Beebe writes:
> A build of coreutils-4.5.1 on DEC Alpha GNU/Linux (Red Hat 6.2)
> exposes an apparent incompatibility with gettext-0.11.x:
> 
>       gcc  -g -O2   -o uptime  uptime.o ../lib/libfetish.a  
> ../lib/libfetish.a  
>       uptime.o: In function `print_uptime':
>       /local/build/coreutils-4.5.1/src/uptime.c:142: undefined reference to 
> `ngettext'
>       /local/build/coreutils-4.5.1/src/uptime.c:142: undefined reference to 
> `ngettext'
>       /local/build/coreutils-4.5.1/src/uptime.c:144: undefined reference to 
> `ngettext'
>       /local/build/coreutils-4.5.1/src/uptime.c:144: undefined reference to 
> `ngettext'
>       collect2: ld returned 1 exit status

This patch to coreutils should fix it. The explanation is that since
coreutils doesn't specify its need for ngettext, during
autoconfiguration the libc and /usr/include/libintl.h is picked, which
contains 'gettext' but not 'ngettext'. (RedHat 6.2 uses a glibc 2.1.x
I think.)

2002-09-07  Bruno Haible  <address@hidden>

        * configure.ac: Add need-ngettext to AM_GNU_GETTEXT invocation.

*** configure.ac.bak    Fri Aug  9 11:59:57 2002
--- configure.ac        Sat Sep  7 15:23:43 2002
***************
*** 244,250 ****
  
  jm_LIB_CHECK
  
! AM_GNU_GETTEXT([external])
  
  AC_CONFIG_FILES(
    Makefile
--- 244,250 ----
  
  jm_LIB_CHECK
  
! AM_GNU_GETTEXT([external], [need-ngettext])
  
  AC_CONFIG_FILES(
    Makefile


> Trapping the preprocessor output shows that there are two colliding
> definitions of ngettext:
> ...
> The result is that uptime.c gets expanded to
> 
> ...
>       extern char *ngettext  (const char *__msgid1,
>                                            const char *__msgid2,
>                                            unsigned long int __n)  
>              __asm__ (""    "libintl_ngettext"  ) ;
> ...

This analysis looks fishy: it doesn't explain why you get a link error
for 'ngettext', not for 'libintl_gettext' and 'libintl_ngettext'.

Bruno