[Libguestfs] [PATCH libnbd v2] README: Document additional packages

[Eric Blake]

On Mon, Apr 17, 2023 at 07:29:04PM +0200, Laszlo Ersek wrote:
> >  
> >  ## Building from source
> >  
> > +Building from source requires additional packages. On rpm based system
> > +use:

Either "On an rpm based system use" or "On rpm based systems use"
sounds better

> [2]
> "Required for building from git, optional for building from tarballs:"
> 
> I *think* autoconf is only needed for the "autoreconf" step, which is
> specific to building from git; it is presumably not needed for building
> from a tarball.
> 
> I believe the same applies to automake. I've checked latest tarball
> <https://download.libguestfs.org/libnbd/1.15-development/libnbd-1.15.13.tar.gz>;
> it contains both "Makefile.am" files and "Makefile.in" files. According
> to the comments in the "Makefile.in" files, automake generates
> Makefile.in from Makefile.am, and "Makefile.in" is the input file for
> ./configure. So I think at least in theory we could technically drop the
> "Makefile.am" files from the tarball. Either way, automake should only
> be necessary when building from a git checkout, not when building from a
> tarball.
> 
> I guess (?) libtool is required in both cases though.

The intent of the GNU folks is that the three autotools (autoconf,
automake, and libtool) are developer-only (they all require perl and
GNU m4, things that aren't necessarily available on non-developer
machines), and therefore 'make dist' packages enough of their output
into the tarball that you do not have to have any of those tools
available to build the tarball.

> 
> I'm not familiar with autotools internals, so I can't say anything
> definitive here; I guess I'd propose putting autoconf and automake under
> [2], and libtool under [1]. Rich, Eric?

Libtool should also be in [2]; if it has shifted into [1], that's a
bug that should reported to the upstream libtool folks.

> 
> Again, sorry that I didn't think this through under v1 already.
> 
> Laszlo
> 

-- 
Eric Blake, Principal Software Engineer
Red Hat, Inc.           +1-919-301-3266
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