Re: acgeneral.m4 & unsupported case patterns

[Akim Demaille]

On 23 May 2000, Akim Demaille wrote:
> How would you write this:
> 
>     case $ac_package in
>       [*[^-a-zA-Z0-9_]*]) AC_MSG_ERROR([invalid package: $ac_package]);;
>     esac
| Your example could be rewritten to use a dummy case which is the
| complement, and changing the case you're looking for to the default
| of the case statement.
| 
| The existing autoconf scripts use this in several places.

No, I don't think you can: there is no Kleene star nor anchor which
would make it possible.  In one word, I know how to say `there exist'
in fnmatch, I don't know how to say `for all'.

        Akim