Re: Quick cut at an autoconf tutorial

"Thomas G. Lockhart" <lockhart@alumni.caltech.edu> writes:
>> 8. There's really no substitute for reading the autoconf manual ;-).

> Sure, didn't even know one existed. Don't know if it is shipped on my
> machine, and don't know where to look for one.
> Oh boy, maybe I'll get to use GNU info! Not. Is there a hardcopy or html
> version somewhere? *sigh*

Picky picky.  The manual comes with the autoconf distribution tarball.
The master copy is in GNU "texinfo" format, looks like.  I always use
the GNU-info-format version of it, which gets installed automatically
by autoconf's install script.  But this is convenient for me because
I use the One True Editor, Emacs ;-) ;-).  If you don't live in Emacs
then I agree info format is less than convenient.

It is possible to generate html or latex (hence PostScript, hence nice-
looking hardcopy) from texinfo sources.  (Basically texinfo is the same
idea as SGML but a few years before its time.)  I'm not an expert on
how to do either process, not having ever felt the need.  If you look
around the net you can certainly get the tools for this, and possibly
even find the autoconf manual already converted to a format you like.

Or you can just read the texinfo source file.  It's certainly no less
legible than sgml source.

            regards, tom lane