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nrwilk
August 7th, 2007, 11:02 PM
I've been working on a C++ project using ncurses, and I'm getting tired of issuing the same ultra-long g++ command over and over.

So, I decided to start learning GNU's autotools. I found what was supposed to be a beginner's tutorial, and it seemed dated. The program that they use is a hello world program which has no outside dependencies. I need at least ncurses to build it, and I can't find a tutorial which will describe the process to an intermediate programmer, including dependency checks. Everything seems to be for the beginner or a huge tome full of information that I don't need.

Does anyone have a suggestion for an up-to-date intermediate tutorial? Or, any other suggestions? How do most people learn to use autotools?

Thanks a lot for any help! :)
vambo
August 7th, 2007, 11:13 PM
Not up to snuff on auto tools. However thoroughly recommend this

http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/make2/

I know it's not free, but to me it's worth the money. Even if it does appear to be rather long in the tooth.
hod139
August 8th, 2007, 01:15 AM
Autotools is a monster with a crazy language syntax. I prefer using cmake (http://www.cmake.org/HTML/Index.html). It is much simpler and intelligent. Another option is scons (http://www.scons.org/), which uses python for the scripting language. I suggest you learn one of those two over autotools.
samjh
August 8th, 2007, 01:38 AM
Here's a tutorial I found useful:
http://www-src.lip6.fr/homepages/Alexandre.Duret-Lutz/autotools.html
nrwilk
August 8th, 2007, 02:06 AM
Autotools is a monster with a crazy language syntax. I prefer using cmake (http://www.cmake.org/HTML/Index.html). It is much simpler and intelligent. Another option is scons (http://www.scons.org/), which uses python for the scripting language. I suggest you learn one of those two over autotools.

Thanks a lot! I'll look into cmake and scons.


Here's a tutorial I found useful:
http://www-src.lip6.fr/homepages/Alexandre.Duret-Lutz/autotools.html

Great! This is the first tutorial that I've seen where the versions of automake and autoconf are anywhere close to the versions I have!
spookware
August 8th, 2007, 03:29 AM
Thank you for that tutorial link. That was very helpfull.
nrwilk
August 8th, 2007, 08:37 AM
Thank you for that tutorial link. That was very helpfull.

Word. I have fully functioning configure and make files for my project now. Thank you! that tutorial was the best one I've seen so far. And, it's up-to-date too. 8-)

Thanks again!
samjh
August 8th, 2007, 12:35 PM
Word. I have fully functioning configure and make files for my project now. Thank you! that tutorial was the best one I've seen so far. And, it's up-to-date too. 8-)

Thanks again!

Any time! I scratched my head against Autotools so much that I was about to give up learning it until I found that tutorial. So I was compelled to post it. :)