10. Hints, helps and FAQs

This is a collection of issues that have come up and some approaches to them. As I collect more, I'll add some organization, too.

`version string'

Q: "One [consistency issue] is the version string. It is set in configure.in for autoconf and in the defs file for autogen, where they really are the same value."

A: There are several possible approaches. Well, lots of approaches, but I'll enumerate a few here:

1. AutoGen definitions can derive their string value from the output of a shell script. Therefore, you can grep and sed the `configure.ac' file.

2. `configure' (`configure.ac') is just a shell script, too. It can run a script whose purpose is to echo out the version, so both `configure' and AutoGen can easily use the same script.

3. You can make an `configure.ac.tpl' template and generate `configure.ac' from AutoGen. This would mean, however, you could not run configure before this.

4. You can make a `version.def.in' file and create `version.def' when you run configure. Likewise, this would mean you would have to configure the product before generating any files that needed the version from `version.def'.