Sigh. I failed to note that vc-dwim did not dwim; my summary first line was once again not recognized. (And I guess I should update the date.) I'll figure that out before pushing, but anyway, the content of the patch is what really needs review. Here's the actual ChangeLog entry as written ... -k
2020-01-03 Karl Berry <k...@freefriends.org> automake: Support byte compilation in older Emacsen * lib/am/lisp.am (am__emacs_byte_compile_setup) [FIRST]: define new make variable, to use byte-compile-dest-file-function if available, else byte-compile-dest-file. (.el.elc): use it. * t/lisp-loadpath.sh: skip test if emacs version is <= 23, since their -L ordering is backwards. * NEWS: update.