Re: problem with 'configure' on AIX-4.3.3.0 (tar, fileutils)

[Akim Demaille]

| AC_ISC_POSIX has existed for years, and many packages use it.  At best
| we could mark it as obsolescent.  But, being more conservative, I'd
| prefer merely to warn that it will become obsolescent eventually, in
| the documentation.

It's really a pain that this macro exists IMHO.  The user should not
know about it, it should be hooked to something more standard,
perhaps simply AC_PROG_CC.

| > Can't it go into streerror?
| 
| Sorry, I don't understand this comment.  Autoconf doesn't mention
| strerror.  Perhaps you're thinking of a new autoconf feature that I'm
| not familiar with?

Sorry, I really thought we had something for streerror, but it's only
strerror_r.  And anyway you demonstrated it's not a solution since
there are other functions living in there.

| Anyway, the problem here is not limited to strerror; it occurs with
| other functions.  strerror is merely the canary that is sent into the
| mine.
| 
| > Are there other functions that need it?
| 
| Not in autoconf itself, but lots of GNU programs use AC_ISC_POSIX:
| A2ps, Bash, Bison, CVS, Diffutils, Enscript, Gzip, ...,

I was referring to other functions à la strerror.  I don't know for
the others, but the a2ps maintainer put it in there just in case, w/o
understanding if it's relevant or not :)  Precisely because this macro
and other system related macros are obscure, with fuzzy semantics.