ACLOCAL(1)

📦
version 1.17 · 3 versions
, in alpine 3.22

💅 aclocal(1) — the girlies' guide to User Commands

okay so bestie, welcome to aclocal, one of those little Unix manual pages that's actually doing a LOT under the hood. she lives in the User Commands section of the manual, and she's here to make your configure.ac dreams come true ✨

🎀 NAME 🎀

aclocal — generate aclocal.m4 by scanning configure.ac

like... that's literally her whole job and she's iconic for it 💖

🦋 SYNOPSIS 🦋

aclocal [OPTION]...

yes bestie, just toss options at her, she can handle it 🙌

🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

Generate 'aclocal.m4' by scanning 'configure.ac' or 'configure.in'

that's it. that's the vibe. she reads your configure file, she spits out an m4 file. main character energy fr fr 👑

✨ OPTIONS ✨

  • --automake-acdir=DIR — the directory that's holding all the m4 files automake provides (her own personal stash 💅)
  • --aclocal-path=PATH — a colon-separated list of directories to go searching through for third-party local files, iykyk
  • --system-acdir=DIR — the directory holding third-party files that live system-wide 🗂️
  • --diff[=COMMAND] — run COMMAND [diff -u] on the M4 files that would be changed. ngl, this one implies --install AND --dry-run, so it's doing the most (affectionate)
  • --dry-run — pretend to do the thing, but do NOT actually update any file 🙈 like a rehearsal, not the real show
  • --force — always update the output file, no questions asked, no matter what 💀
  • --help — print this help, then exit. classic. love her for it 🫶
  • -I DIR — add that directory to the search list for .m4 files 🔍
  • --install — copy those third-party files over to the first -I directory 📦
  • --output=FILE — put the output in FILE (default is aclocal.m4, bestie)
  • --print-ac-dir — print the name of the directory holding system-wide third-party m4 files, then exit 🖨️✨
  • --verbose — don't be silent, spill the tea ☕
  • --version — print version number, then exit 🔢
  • -W, --warnings=CATEGORY — report the warnings falling in CATEGORY. defaults to $WARNINGS (yes, an environment variable, she's fancy 💜)

⭐ Warning categories are: ⭐

  • cross — cross compilation issues
  • gnu — GNU coding standards (this is the default in gnu and gnits modes)
  • obsolete — obsolete features or constructions (default 👀)
  • override — user redefinitions of Automake rules or variables
  • portability — portability issues (default in gnu and gnits modes)
  • portability-recursive — nested Make variables (default with -Wportability)
  • extra-portability — extra portability issues related to obscure tools 🛠️
  • syntax — dubious syntactic constructs (default)
  • unsupported — unsupported or incomplete features (default)

💀 -W also understands: 💀

  • all — turn on ALL the warnings. every single one. no survivors 🔥
  • none — turn off all the warnings. silence. peace. quiet. 😌
  • no-CATEGORY — turn off warnings in CATEGORY (so like, no-portability, you get the vibe)
  • error — treat all enabled warnings as errors 😭 so like, warnings but make them devastating

👑 AUTHOR 👑

Written by Tom Tromey <tromey@redhat.com>

and Alexandre Duret-Lutz <adl@gnu.org>.

two legends, honestly. we stan 💖

🐛 REPORTING BUGS 🐛

found a bug? tell them!! they wanna know!! don't suffer in silence bestie 🫶

Copyright © 2024 Free Software Foundation, Inc. License GPLv2+: GNU GPL version 2 or later <https://gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html>

This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.

There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law. like none. zero. don't come for them if it breaks 😭

🧚 SEE ALSO 🧚

The full documentation for aclocal is maintained as a Texinfo manual. If the info and aclocal programs are properly installed at your site, the command

info automake

should give you access to the complete manual. go read it, it's giving lore 📚✨

okay so that's the whole page, and ngl you ate that 💅

GNU automake 1.17 🦋 — dated May 2025 — catch you in the next manpage, bestie!! 🎀💖

📦 where this page comes from