Re: [AD] configure trouble

[Mike Fahlbusch <mcf@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Peter Wang wrote:
> On 2005-06-04, Chris <chris.kcat@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> > Peter Wang wrote:
> >
> > > On 2005-06-04, Chris <chris.kcat@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > > > Yes, the ever-elusive configure script problem. I did a make veryclean, 
> > > > updated Allegro to the latest CVS, and ran configure with no options.
> > >
> > > Try:
> > > 	autoconf
> > > 	autoheader
> > > 	./configure
> >
> > Unfortunately, it's not so simple to track. The problem comes and goes 
> > on its own. In fact, it happened once before when gmail got blocked from 
> > sf.net mailing lists.. but it never happened again until just now. I 
> > don't know what causes it, and it seems random in nature.
>
>
> Ok.  I have seen configure rerun itself repeatedly (I always assumed it
> was some timestamp thing), but never aborting in the way you mentioned.

I've used configure for years under mingw MSYS, cygwin and various 
flavours of Linux.  One time I've seen this happen is when one of the 
files has been changed while it is being read.  This causes the line 
counter or char counter or whatever to continue reading at the wrong 
place in the file.  That's when bizarre errors and unexpected 
terminations occur.
Also if some system packages are missing or corrupted I've seen it 
happen.  It's also possible to run out of memory, swap space or disk 
space and programs lose their way.  Some questions to ask are: Does it 
never happen when the computer has just booted?  Does it only happen 
after heavy usage of the computer?  Is there more than one xterm open, 
or has configure been run in more than one xterm?
I've also seem make bomb out for no reason, it continues fine when it's 
re-run.  This was using both djgpp and mingw.  I can't remember it 
happening for the last year or two.