Re: [HACKERS] Proposed autoconf change: rip out search for 'install' - Mailing list pgsql-hackers

From Tom Lane
Subject Re: [HACKERS] Proposed autoconf change: rip out search for 'install'
Date
Msg-id 7409.913081057@sss.pgh.pa.us
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In response to Re: [HACKERS] Proposed autoconf change: rip out search for 'install'  ("Thomas G. Lockhart" <lockhart@alumni.caltech.edu>)
Responses Re: [HACKERS] Proposed autoconf change: rip out search for 'install'
Re: [HACKERS] Proposed autoconf change: rip out search for 'install'
List pgsql-hackers
"Thomas G. Lockhart" <lockhart@alumni.caltech.edu> writes:
> Anyway, Tom, do you think that the AC_PROG_INSTALL function might help
> on the HP? If so, we've probably stressed it pretty good...

AC_PROG_INSTALL would solve the problem on HP --- one of the ad hoc
tests that it uses is to ignore /etc/install and /usr/sbin/install,
which are the two places that that program might live on HP.  (BTW,
AC_PROG_INSTALL's comments refer to this as SysV install, so I think
you are being unfairly hard on HP to blame them for the lack of
compatibility.  They *are* being compatible ... with SysV.  And
normal users don't put either of those directories into PATH.)

I don't *know* of any cases where AC_PROG_INSTALL would fail, and
certainly it's pretty widely used.  I'm just being paranoid because
it has no way to directly test what the install program really does ---
it is using a bunch of ad-hoc rules to guess whether a program it finds
is likely to be BSD-compatible or not.  That's not my idea of how a
reliable autoconfiguration test ought to work.
        regards, tom lane


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