lfs-book/appendixa/autoconf-desc.xml

<sect2>
<title>Contents</title>

<para>The Autoconf package contains the autoconf, autoheader, autoreconf,
autoscan, autoupdate and ifnames programs</para>

</sect2>

<sect2><title>Description</title>

<sect3><title>autoconf</title>
<para>Autoconf is a tool for producing shell scripts that automatically
configure software source code packages to adapt to many kinds of
UNIX-like systems.  The configuration scripts produced by Autoconf are
independent of Autoconf when they are run, so their users do not need to
have Autoconf.</para></sect3>

<sect3><title>autoheader</title>
<para>The autoheader program can create a template file of C #define
statements for configure to use</para></sect3>

<sect3><title>autoreconf</title>
<para>If there are a lot of Autoconf-generated configure scripts, the
autoreconf program can save some work.  It runs autoconf (and
autoheader, where appropriate) repeatedly to remake the Autoconf
configure scripts and configuration header templates in the directory
tree rooted at the current directory.</para></sect3>

<sect3><title>autoscan</title>
<para>The autoscan program can help to create a configure.in file for
a software package. autoscan examines source files in the directory
tree rooted at a directory given as a command line argument, or the
current directory if none is given.  It searches the source files for
common portability problems and creates a file configure.scan which
is a preliminary configure.in for that package.</para></sect3>

<sect3><title>autoupdate</title>
<para>The autoupdate program updates a configure.in file that calls
Autoconf macros by their old names to use the current 
macro names.</para></sect3>

<sect3><title>ifnames</title>
<para>ifnames can help when writing a configure.in for a software
package. It prints the identifiers that the package already uses in C
preprocessor conditionals. If a package has already been set up to
have some portability, this program can help to figure out what its
configure needs to check for. It may help fill in some gaps in a
configure.in generated by autoscan.</para></sect3>

</sect2>