Re: pgsql-server/. configure configure.in

Bruce Momjian <pgman@candle.pha.pa.us> writes:
> I don't understand.  Are you trying to save bytes in configure.in?  If
> we can make problem resolution easier, why wouldn't we do that?

I think he's saying that trying to narrow down the reasons for a failure
is not configure's job: if we buy into that then we'll soon have a
monstrous configure script with a huge number of essentially duplicative
error checks.  That costs maintenance effort, not to mention user time
to run a slower script.

Also, the more such checks we provide in the hope of offering a "more
specific" error message, the greater the chance of providing a message
that is more specific and *wrong*, thus misleading the user and causing
him to waste time instead of save it.

"Look in config.log" is good general-purpose advice for understanding
configure-detected problems.  I don't think we should spend effort
on special-casing problems that are adequately explained if one looks
in the log.

What *would* be worth doing if it's feasible is to have configure
automatically spit out the relevant section of config.log when it
finds a problem...

            regards, tom lane