Benoit SIGOURE wrote:
> The fact
> that it said "Gnulib module: —" sounded weird to me, but I found that
> since this was a single and simple function, it could be that there
> is no need to make a whole module around it. The "Portability
> problems not fixed by Gnulib:" simply told me that the replacement
> function wasn't working on the architectures listed but since I don't
> target these for the time being, it didn't disturb me.
Thanks for explaining this. It is often hard to understand why a doc is bad.
> If the function is not available, why is it there in the first
> place? If the intent of the doc is to list all functions with
> possible portability issues (sic!), why not write something more
> explicit such as "Gnulib module: @emph{not available}."?
Whether "---" means that a module is not needed or not available, depends
on your evaluation of the severity of the portability problems. Therefore
I cannot write this explicitly for each module.
But what I can do, is to help explain this situation a bit:
2007-10-04 Bruno Haible <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
* doc/gnulib.texi (Function Substitutes): Explain what an absent module
means.
Reported by Benoît Sigoure <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>.
*** doc/gnulib.texi.orig 2007-10-05 02:00:14.000000000 +0200
--- doc/gnulib.texi 2007-10-05 02:00:05.000000000 +0200
***************
*** 635,640 ****
--- 635,649 ----
fixed by Gnulib, and which (known) portability problems are not worked around
by Gnulib.
+ The notation ``Gnulib module: ---'' means that Gnulib does not provide a
+ module providing a substitute for the function. When the list
+ ``Portability problems not fixed by Gnulib'' is empty, such a module is
+ not needed: No portability problems are known. Otherwise, it indicates
+ that such a module would be useful but is not available: Noone so far
+ found this function important enough to contribute a substitute for it.
+ If you need this particular function, you may write to
+ @code{<bug-gnulib at gnu dot org>}.
+
@menu
* FD_CLR::
* FD_ISSET::
