In order to get [stuff `command` more stuff] in the output, I put [`stuff “command`”’ more stuff’] in the macro definition. Actually the output is [stuff `command`'’ more stuff] but the ['’] is effectively removed by the shell.

The problem with using changequote is that it only applies to the first run through m4. It appears that the block in question goes through m4 twice, and that’s where the quoting headache comes from.

Instead of using changequote([,]), I put in enough quotes to survive the multiple m4 runs, and use the fact that the string (two single-quotes) is a null string in sh, in order to balance the m4-esque backtick-quote pairs.

E.g. in order to get in the output, I have `stuff “command`”’ more stuff’ in the macro. Actually, the output is , but since it’s interpreted by /bin/sh, ‘’ is effectively ignored. Ugly, but it works.

Patch against the original links.m4. There’s another little fix in there, as discussed the ‘-’ in front of mkdir shouldn’t be there, it’s a make construct and doesn’t work in the middle of a compound sh command.


--- devtools/M4/UNIX/links.m4.nik       2006-07-27 14:36:07.744667000 +0100
+++ devtools/M4/UNIX/links.m4   2006-07-27 14:36:36.849567000 +0100
@@ -20,16 +20,11 @@
define(`bldMAKE_SOURCE_LINKS',
`bldFOREACH(`bldMAKE_SOURCE_LINK(', $1)'dnl
)dnl
-dnl Change the quote definition temporarily so that we can use backticks
-dnl in the next bit of Makefile
-changequote([,])dnl
-define([bldMAKE_TARGET_LINKS],
-[      for i in $2; do \
-       -mkdir -p `dirname $$i`; \
+define(`bldMAKE_TARGET_LINKS',
+`      for i in $2; do \
+       mkdir -p ``dirname $$i`'''; \
        rm -f $$i; \
        ln -s ${DESTDIR}$1 $$i; \
     done
-])dnl
-dnl Change the quotes back
-changequote(`, ')dnl
+')dnl
 


— devtools/M4/UNIX/links.nik 2006-07-26 12:33:13.423230000 +0100
+++ devtools/M4/UNIX/links.m4 2006-07-26 12:29:29.005179000 +0100
@@ -22,14 +22,14 @@
)dnl
dnl Change the quote definition temporarily so that we can use backticks
dnl in the next bit of Makefile
-changequote(”,”)dnl
-define(”bldMAKE_TARGET_LINKS”,
-” for i in $2; do \
+changequote([,])dnl
+define([bldMAKE_TARGET_LINKS],
+[ for i in $2; do \
-mkdir -p `dirname $$i`; \
rm -f $$i; \
ln -s ${DESTDIR}$1 $$i; \
- done”
-)dnl
+ done
+])dnl
dnl Change the quotes back
changequote(`, ‘)dnl

With

changequote(`, \')dnl

it gets further through the build process, but eventually fails when trying to make

.../executable.m4:42 EOF in quote

Since the manpage for m4 says:

changequote without arguments restores the original values (that is,`\’).

I\’ve tried changequote() and changequote too, to no effect. I\’ve even tried changequote(\"`\", \"\'\").

Here\’s the current links.m4 (which doesn\’t work). If you can drop that in to devtools/M4/UNIX/, and get sh Build to work then I\’m interested in what you had to change.

I put your macro in my site.config.m4, with cq.([,]) before and cq.(`,’) at the end and it works fine. If I use cq.(,) at the end, it explodes spectacularly.

The reason it works standalone is because there’s nothing else to quote, so turning quoting off doesn’t cause a problem.