On Wed, Mar 4, 2026, at 6:51 PM, Nick Bowler wrote: > On Tue, Mar 03, 2026 at 12:20:32PM -0500, Zack Weinberg wrote: >> The last thing I want to squeeze into autoconf 2.73 is a new >> autoreconf feature, an option --exclude that can be used to tell >> autoreconf not to run particular tools even if its heuristics say >> they are necessary. We had a lot of problems in the past few cycles >> with autoreconf running auxiliary tools when people didn't want it >> to, so I'm hoping this provides a self-help option for future issues >> along those lines. > > Why implement a new option for this, instead of using the existing > environment variables which have been supported by autoreconf > since 2001?
Discoverability. If someone's having a problem with autoreconf running something it shouldn't, and they look at autoreconf --help, the --exclude option will be right there. The --help text does also mention the environment variables, but they're described as a way to control *what command* is run - like, in case you have autopoint somewhere off the default path - not as a way to control *whether* the commands are run. I could add a sentence like "To prevent autoreconf from running a command, set COMMANDNAME=: in the environment" right after the mention of the variables, but my guess is people will get locked in on the idea of an *option* and not notice that sentence. zw
