%global vs. %define (Re: rpms/clamav/devel clamav.spec,1.10,1.11)

[Enrico Scholz]

ville.skytta at iki.fi (Ville Skyttä) writes:

>> use %global instead of %define
>
> I'm probably not the only one wondering what's the difference between
> these two.

%global will be evaluated immediately while %define will be evaluated
delayed. E.g. you can do

| %global foo   abc
| %global foo   %foo-XYZ

but not

| %define bar   zyx
| %define bar   %bar-CBA


I prefer %global over %define to workaround/not trigger bugs in rpm
which let it forget macro definitions under certain circumstances. See

        https://bugzilla.redhat.com/beta/show_bug.cgi?id=147238

for more details.


Enrico