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- GNU M4 NEWS - User visible changes.
- * Noteworthy changes in release 1.4.18 (2016-12-31) [stable]
- ** Diagnose --word-regexp as unsupported if it was not configured.
- ** Preliminary support for OS/2.
- ** A number of portability improvements inherited from gnulib.
- * Noteworthy changes in release 1.4.17 (2013-09-22) [stable]
- ** Fix compilation with newer glibc headers.
- ** Fix a failure with diverting large amounts of text on mingw (does
- not affect platforms that can rename an open file).
- ** A number of portability improvements inherited from gnulib.
- * Noteworthy changes in release 1.4.16 (2011-03-01) [stable]
- ** Fix regressions in the `index' builtin. On glibc platforms, this
- avoids false positives from a strstr bug in glibc 2.9 through 2.12;
- on many other platforms, it fixes two separate regressions, a false
- positive introduced in 1.4.11 and a false negative in 1.4.15.
- ** A number of portability improvements inherited from gnulib.
- * Noteworthy changes in release 1.4.15 (2010-08-31) [stable]
- ** Fix regression introduced in 1.4.9b where the `format' builtin could
- crash on an invalid format string.
- ** Fix compilation against newer glibc, and on AIX 7.1BETA.
- ** A number of portability improvements inherited from gnulib.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.14 (2010-02-24) [stable]
- Released by Eric Blake, based on git version 1.4.13.*
- ** Fix regression introduced in 1.4.12 where executing with stdout closed
- could crash m4 on exit on some platforms.
- ** Fix regressions introduced in 1.4.13 in the `esyscmd' builtin, where
- closed file descriptors could interfere with child execution, and where
- a child status of 127 made m4 print a spurious message to stderr.
- ** Fix a security hole in 'make dist', present since at least M4 1.4, that
- could affect anybody attempting to redistribute modified sources (see
- Automake CVE-2009-4029).
- ** A number of portability improvements inherited from gnulib.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.13 (2009-04-01) [stable]
- Released by Eric Blake, based on git version 1.4.12.*
- ** The manual is now distributed under the terms of FDL 1.3.
- ** The `divert' and `undivert' builtins have been made more efficient
- when using temporary files for large diversions.
- ** The `translit' builtin has been made more efficient when the second
- argument is short.
- ** The input engine has been optimized for faster processing.
- ** The command line option `--debugfile', introduced in 1.4.7, now
- treats its argument as optional, in order to allow setting the debug
- output back to stderr when used without an argument; and order is now
- significant with respect to command line files. You must therefore use
- `m4 --debugfile=trace file', not `m4 file --debugfile trace'. This
- change does not affect the deprecated `-o'/`--error-output' option.
- ** The `syscmd' and `esyscmd' builtins can be configured to use an
- alternate shell, via the new `configure' option `--with-syscmd-shell'.
- ** A number of portability improvements inherited from gnulib.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.12 (2008-10-10) [stable]
- Released by Eric Blake, based on git version 1.4.11.*
- ** Fix regression introduced in 1.4.4b where using `traceon' could delete
- a macro. This was most noticeable with `traceon(`traceon')', but
- would also happen in cases such as `foo(traceon(`foo'))'.
- ** Fix regression introduced in 1.4.7 where `m4 -N9' died with an assertion
- failure.
- ** Fix regression introduced in 1.4.11 where `defn' died with an assertion
- failure on a traced but undefined macro.
- ** New `-g'/`--gnu' command-line option overrides `-G'/`--traditional'.
- For now, the environment variable POSIXLY_CORRECT has no effect on M4
- behavior; but a future release of M4 will behave as though --traditional
- is implied if POSIXLY_CORRECT is set (this future change is necessary,
- because in the current release, there is no way to disable GNU
- extensions that conflict with POSIX without the use of a non-POSIX
- command-line argument). Clients of M4 that want to use GNU extensions,
- even when POSIXLY_CORRECT is set, should start using the -g command-line
- argument, even though it is currently a no-op if -G did not appear
- earlier in the command line, so that the client will not break in the
- face of an upgraded m4 and a POSIXLY_CORRECT execution environment.
- ** The `-L'/`--nesting-limit' command-line option now defaults to 0 for
- unlimited on platforms that can detect and deal with stack overflow. On
- systems that lack alternate stack support, such as Cygwin, and on
- systems that do not obey the POSIX semantics for distinguishing stack
- overflow from other exceptions, such as Linux, you can optionally
- install the libsigsegv library (version 2.6 or newer recommended) to
- enhance m4's ability to accurately report stack overflow:
- http://www.gnu.org/software/libsigsegv/
- ** A number of portability improvements inherited from gnulib.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.11 (2008-04-02) [stable]
- Released by Eric Blake, based on git version 1.4.10a
- ** Security fixes for the -F option, for bugs present since -F was
- introduced in 1.3: Avoid core dump with 'm4 -F file -t undefined', and
- avoid arbitrary code execution with certain file names.
- ** Fix regression introduced in 1.4.9b in the `divert' builtin when more
- than 512 kibibytes are saved in diversions on platforms like NetBSD
- or darwin where fopen(name,"a+") seeks to the end of the file.
- ** The output of the `maketemp' and `mkstemp' builtins is now quoted if a
- file was created. This is a minor security fix, because it was possible
- (although rather unlikely) that an unquoted string could match an
- existing macro name, such that use of the `mkstemp' output would trigger
- inadvertent macro expansion and operate on the wrong file name.
- ** Enhance the `defn' builtin to support concatenation of multiple text
- arguments, as required by POSIX. However, at this time, it is not
- possible to concatenate a builtin macro with anything else; a warning is
- now issued if this is attempted, although a future version of M4 may
- lift this restriction to match other implementations.
- ** Enhance the `format' builtin to parse all C99 floating point numbers,
- even on platforms where strtod(3) is buggy, although the replacement
- function does have the known issue of rounding errors when parsing
- some decimal floating point values. This fixes testsuite failures
- introduced in 1.4.9b.
- ** Enhance the `index' builtin to guarantee linear behavior, in spite of
- the surprisingly large number of systems with a brain-dead quadratic
- strstr(3).
- ** A number of portability improvements inherited from gnulib.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.10 (2007-07-09) [stable]
- Released by Eric Blake, based on CVS version 1.4.9c
- ** Upgrade from GPL version 2 to GPL version 3 or later.
- ** A number of portability improvements inherited from gnulib.
- ** Avoid undefined behavior introduced in 1.4.9b in the `format' builtin
- when handling %c. However, this area of code has never been documented,
- and currently does not match the POSIX behavior of printf(1), so it may
- have further changes in the next version.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.9b (2007-05-29) [beta]
- Released by Eric Blake, based on CVS version 1.4.9a
- ** Fix regression introduced in 1.4.9 in the `eval' builtin when performing
- division.
- ** Fix regression introduced in 1.4.8 in the `-F' option that made it
- impossible to freeze more than 512 kibibytes of diverted text.
- ** The synclines option `-s' no longer generates sync lines in the middle of
- multiline comments or quoted strings.
- ** Work around a number of corner-case POSIX compliance bugs in various
- broken stdio libraries. In particular, the `syscmd' builtin behaves
- more predictably when stdin is seekable.
- ** The `format' builtin now understands formats such as %a, %A, and %'hhd,
- and works around a number of platform printf bugs. Furthermore, the
- sequence format(%*.*d,-1,-1,1) no longer outputs random data. However,
- some non-compliant platforms such as mingw still have known bugs in
- strtod that may cause testsuite failures.
- ** The testsuite is improved to also run gnulib portability tests for the
- features that M4 imports from gnulib.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.9 (2007-03-23) [stable]
- Released by Eric Blake, based on CVS version 1.4.8c
- ** Minor documentation and portability cleanups.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.8b (2007-02-24) [beta]
- Released by Eric Blake, based on CVS version 1.4.8a
- ** Fix a regression introduced in 1.4.8 that made m4 unable to process
- files larger than 2GiB on some platforms.
- ** Fix a regression introduced in 1.4.8 that made m4 dump core when
- invoked as 'm4 -- file'.
- ** The `eval' builtin now follows C precedence rules. Additionally, the
- short-circuit operators correctly short-circuit division by zero. The
- previously undocumented alias of '=' meaning '==' in eval now triggers a
- deprecation warning, so that a future version of M4 can implement a form
- of variable assignment as an extension.
- ** The `include' builtin now affects exit status on failure, as required by
- POSIX. Use `sinclude' if you need a successful exit status.
- ** The `-E'/`--fatal-warnings' command-line option now has two levels. When
- specified only once, warnings affect exit status, but execution
- continues, so that you can see all warnings instead of fixing them one
- at a time. To achieve 1.4.8 behavior, where the first warning
- immediately exits, specify -E twice on the command line.
- ** A new `--warn-macro-sequence' command-line option allows detection of
- sequences in `define' and `pushdef' definitions that match an optional
- regular expression. The default regular expression is
- `\$\({[^}]*}\|[0-9][0-9]+\)', corresponding to the sequences that might
- not behave correctly when upgrading to the eventual M4 2.0. By default,
- M4 2.0 will follow the POSIX requirement that a macro definition
- containing `$11' must expand to the first argument concatenated with 1,
- rather than the eleventh argument; and will take advantage of the POSIX
- wording that allows implementations to treat `${11}' as the eleventh
- argument instead of literal text. Be aware that Autoconf 2.61 will not
- work with this option enabled with the default regular expression; but
- Autoconf 2.62 will be compatible with this option.
- ** Improved portability to platforms such as BSD/OS and AIX.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.8 (2006-11-20) [stable]
- Released by Eric Blake, based on CVS version 1.4.7a
- ** The `divert' macro and `-H'/`--hashsize' command line option no longer
- cause a core dump when handed extra large values. Also, `divert' now
- uses memory proportional to the number of diversions in use, rather than
- to the maximum diversion number encountered, so that large diversion
- numbers are less likely to exhaust system memory; and is no longer
- limited by the maximum number of file descriptors.
- ** The `--help' and `--version' command line options now consistently
- override all earlier options. For example, `m4 --debugfile=trace
- --help' now no longer accidentally creates an empty file `trace'.
- ** The `-L'/`--nesting-limit' command line option can now be set to 0
- to remove the default limit of 1024. However, it is still possible that
- heavily nested input can cause abrupt program termination due to stack
- overflow.
- ** Problems encountered when writing to standard error, such as with the
- `errprint' macro, now always cause a non-zero exit status.
- ** Warnings and errors issued during macro expansion are now consistently
- reported at the line where the macro name was detected, rather than
- where the close parenthesis resides. Text wrapped by `m4wrap' now
- remembers the location that was in effect when m4wrap was invoked,
- rather than changing to line 0 and the empty string for a file. The
- macros `__line__' and `__file__' now work correctly even as the last
- token in an included file.
- ** The `builtin' and `indir' macros now transparently handle builtin
- tokens generated by `defn'.
- ** When diversions created by the `divert' macro collect enough text that
- M4 must use temporary files, the environment variable $TMPDIR is now
- consulted, and a better effort is made to clean up those files in the
- event of a fatal signal.
- ** The `mkstemp' builtin is added with the same GNU semantics as `maketemp',
- based on the recommendation of POSIX to deprecate the POSIX semantics of
- `maketemp' as inherently insecure. In GNU mode (no -G supplied on the
- command line), `maketemp' silently retains the secure GNU semantics, but
- a future release of M4 will change this to emit a warning. In
- traditional mode (m4 -G), `maketemp' now uses the POSIX-mandated
- insecure semantics, and issues a warning that you should convert your
- script to use `mkstemp' instead. Additionally, `mkstemp' and `maketemp'
- are now well-defined even if the template argument does not end in six
- `X' characters.
- ** The manual has been improved, including a new section on a composite
- macro `foreach'.
- ** The `changecom' and `changequote' macros now treat an empty second
- argument the same as if it were missing, rather than using the empty
- string and making it impossible to end a comment or quote.
- ** The `translit' macro now operates in linear instead of quadratic time,
- and is now eight-bit clean.
- ** The `-D', `-U', `-s', and `-t' command line options now take effect
- after any files encountered earlier on the command line, rather than up
- front, as is done in traditional implementations and required by POSIX.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.7 (2006-09-25) [stable]
- Released by Eric Blake, based on CVS version 1.4.6a
- ** Fix regression from 1.4.5 in handling a file that ends in a macro
- expansion without arguments instead of a newline.
- ** The define and pushdef macros now warn when the first argument is not
- a string, rather than silently doing nothing.
- ** Standard input can now be read more than once, as in 'm4 - file -', and
- is not closed until all wrapped text is handled. This makes a
- difference when stdin is not a regular file, and also fixes bugs when
- using the syscmd or esyscmd macros from wrapped text.
- ** When standard input is a seekable file, the m4exit, syscmd, and esyscmd
- macros now restore the current position to the next unread byte rather
- than discarding an arbitrary amount of buffered data.
- ** SysV command-line compatibility is no longer a goal of GNU M4; the
- focus will be instead on POSIX compatibility. This release continues to
- support previous usage, but adds warnings in areas which will allow a
- future version of GNU M4 to use its own extensions without being tied to
- the SysV command line interface.
- ** The no-op compatibility command line options -B, -N, -S, -T, and
- --diversions may be withdrawn or assigned new meanings in future
- releases, so they now issue a warning if used.
- ** A new command line option -i replaces the compatibility -e as the
- short spelling of --interactive, for consistency with other GNU tools; a
- warning is issued if the old spelling is used, and it may be assigned
- new meaning in future releases.
- ** A new command line option --debugfile replaces the options -o and
- --error-output as the preferred spelling. The old options were
- misleading in their names and inconsistent with other GNU tools; they
- are still silently accepted, but no longer documented in --help, and may
- be assigned new meanings in future releases.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.6 (2006-08-25) [stable]
- Released by Eric Blake, based on CVS version 1.4.5a
- ** Fix buffer overruns in regexp and patsubst macros when handed a trailing
- backslash in the replacement text, or when handling \n substitutions
- beyond the number of \(\) groups.
- ** Fix memory leak in regexp, patsubst, and changeword macros.
- ** The format macro now understands %F, %g, and %G.
- ** When loading frozen files, m4 now exits with status 63 if version
- mismatch is detected.
- ** Fix bugs that occurred when invoked with stdout or stderr closed,
- and detect write failures to stdout or to the target of the debugfile
- macro. In particular, the syscmd and esyscmd macros can no longer
- interfere with the debug stream or diversions.
- ** The m4exit macro now converts values outside the range 0-255 to 1.
- ** It is now an error if a command-line input file ends in the middle of a
- comment, matching the behavior of mid-string and mid-argument
- collection.
- ** The dnl macro now warns if end of file is encountered instead of a
- newline.
- ** The error message when end of file is encountered now uses the file and
- line where the dangling construct started, rather than `NONE:0:'.
- ** The debugmode and __file__ macros, and the -s/--synclines option, now
- show what directory a file was found in when the -I/--include option or
- M4PATH variable had an effect.
- ** The changequote and changecom macros now work with 8-bit characters, and
- quotes and comments that begin with `(' are properly recognized
- following a word.
- ** The new macro __program__ is added, which allows the input file to issue
- an error message that resembles messages from m4. Warning and error
- messages have been reformatted to comply with GNU Coding Standards.
- ** The errprint, m4wrap, and shift macros are now recognized only with
- arguments.
- ** The index, substr, translit, regexp, and patsubst macros now produce
- output when given only one argument, but still warn about a missing
- second argument.
- ** The patsubst macro now reliably finds zero-length matches at the end
- of a string.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.5 (2006-07-15) [stable]
- Released by Eric Blake, based on CVS version 1.4.4c
- ** Fix sysval on BeOS, OS/2, and other systems that store exit status
- in the low-order byte. Additionally, on Unix platforms, if syscmd was
- terminated by a signal, sysval now displays the signal number shifted
- left by eight bits, to match traditional m4 implementations.
- ** The maketemp macro is no longer subject to platform limitations (such as
- 26 or 32 max files from a given template).
- ** Frozen files now require that the first directive be V (version), to
- better diagnose version mismatch. Additionally, if the F directive
- (builtin function) names an unknown builtin that existed in the m4 that
- froze the file but not in the current m4 (for example, changeword), the
- warning is deferred until an attempt is made to actually use the
- builtin. This allows downgrading from beta m4-1.4o to stable m4-1.4.5
- without breaking autoconf.
- ** The format and indir macros are now recognized only with arguments.
- ** The eval macro no longer crashes on x86 architectures when dividing the
- minimum integer by -1.
- ** On systems with ecvt and fcvt, format no longer truncates trailing
- zeroes on integers printed with %.0f. On systems without these
- functions, format is no longer subject to a buffer overflow that
- permitted arbitrary code execution.
- ** On native Windows builds, the macro __windows__ is provided instead of
- __unix__. Likewise, on OS/2 builds, the macro __os2__ is provided.
- This allows input files to determine when syscmd might behave
- differently.
- ** Fix bug in 1.4.3 patch to use \n line-endings that did not work for
- cygwin.
- ** When given the empty string or 0, undivert is now documented as a no-op
- rather than closing stdout, warning about a non-existent file, or trying
- to read a directory as a file.
- ** Many documentation improvements. Also, the manual is now distributed
- under FDL 1.2, rather than a stricter verbatim-only license.
- ** Raise the -L (--nesting-limit) command line option limit from 250 to
- 1024.
- ** The decr, incr, divert, m4exit, and substr macros treat an empty number
- as 0, issue a warning, and expand as normal; rather than issuing an
- error and expanding to the empty string.
- ** The eval macro now treats an empty radix argument as 10, handles radix 1,
- and treats the width argument as number of digits excluding the sign,
- for compatibility with other m4 implementations.
- ** The ifdef, divert, m4exit, substr, and translit macros now correctly
- ignore extra arguments.
- ** The popdef and undefine macros now correctly accept multiple arguments.
- ** Although changeword is on its last leg, if enabled, it now reverts to the
- default (faster) regexp when passed the empty string.
- ** The regexp and substr macros now warn and ignore a trailing backslash in
- the replacement, and warn on \n for n larger than the number of
- sub-expressions in the regexp.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.4b (2006-06-17) [beta]
- Released by Eric Blake, based on CVS version 1.4.4a
- ** Fix a recursive push_string crashing bug, which affected changequote of
- three or more characters on some compilers.
- ** Use automake to fix build portability issues.
- ** Fix a recursive m4wrap crashing bug.
- ** Fix a 1 in 2**32 hash crashing bug.
- ** Tracing a macro by name is now persistent, even if the macro is
- subsequently undefined or redefined. The traceon and traceoff macros no
- longer warn about undefined symbols. This solves a crash when using
- indir on an undefined macro traced with the -t option, as well as an
- incorrect result of ifdef. Furthermore, tracing is no longer
- transferred with builtins, solving the bug of "m4 -tm4_eval" failing to
- give trace output on the input
- "define(`m4_eval',defn(`eval'))m4_eval(1)".
- ** Fix a crash when a macro is undefined while collecting its arguments, by
- always using the definition that was in effect before argument
- collection. This behavior matches the C pre-processor, and means that
- the sequence "define(`f',`1')f(define(`f',`2'))f" is now documented to
- result in "12", rather than the previously undocumented "22".
- ** Update the regex engine to fix several bugs.
- ** Fix a potential crash on machines where char is signed.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.4 (Oct 2005) [stable]
- Released by Gary V. Vaughan
- ** ./configure --infodir=/usr/share/info now works correctly.
- ** When any file named on the command line is missing exit with status 1.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.3 (Mar 2005) [stable]
- Released by Gary V. Vaughan
- ** DESTDIR installs now work correctly.
- ** Don't segfault with uncompilable regexps to changeword().
- ** Always use \n line-endings for frozen files (fixes a Windows bug).
- ** Portability fix for systems lacking mkstemp(3).
- ** Approximately 20% speed up in the common case of usage with autoconf.
- ** Supported on QNX 6.3.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.2 (Aug 2004) [stable]
- Released by Paul Eggert
- ** No user visible changes; portability bug fixes only.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4.1 (Jun 2004) [stable]
- Released by Paul Eggert
- ** maketemp now creates an empty file with the given name, instead of merely
- returning the name of a nonexistent file. This closes a security hole.
- * Noteworthy changes in Version 1.4 (Oct 1994) [stable]
- Released by Franc,ois Pinard
- ** (No user visible changes)
- Version 1.3 - September 1994, by Franc,ois Pinard
- * Diversions are created as needed. Option `-N' is still accepted, but
- otherwise ignored. Users should use only negative diversion numbers,
- instead of high positive numbers, for diverting to nowhere.
- * Diversions should also work faster. No temporary files will be needed
- at all if all diversions taken altogether do not use more than 512K.
- * Frozen state files may be produced with the `--freeze-state' (-F)
- option and later brought back through the `--reload-state' (-R) option.
- Version 1.2 - July 1994, by Franc,ois Pinard
- * In patsubst(STRING, REGEXP, REPLACEMENT), \& in REPLACEMENT has been
- changed to represent this part of STRING matched by the whole REGEXP,
- instead of the whole STRING as before. \0 does the same, but emits a
- diagnostic saying it will disappear in some subsequent release.
- * eval(EXPR) emits a diagnostic if EXPR has suffixed crumb. The same for
- other numeric conversions in incr(), decr(), divert(), etc.
- * `--fatal-warnings' (-E) stops execution at first warning.
- * `--nesting-limit=LEVEL' (-L LEVEL) sets a limit to macro nesting.
- It is initially fixed at 250.
- * `--word-regexp=REGEXP' (-W REGEXP) modifies macro name syntax, like
- does the new `changeword(REGEXP)' macro. This feature is experimental,
- tell me your opinions about it. You do need --enable-changeword at
- configure time to get these things. Do *not* depend on them yet.
- * Trace output format is scannable by GNU Emacs' next-error function.
- * Stack overflow is detected and diagnosed on some capable systems.
- * Various bugs have been corrected, m4 should be more portable. See the
- ChangeLog for details.
- Version 1.1 - November 1993, by Franc,ois Pinard
- Changes which might affect existing GNU m4 scripts:
- * Option `-V' has been removed, use `--version' instead. `--version'
- writes on standard output instead of standard error, and inhibits any
- script execution.
- * `--no-gnu-extensions' has been renamed `--traditional'.
- * In `eval', `^' used to indicate exponentiation, use `**' instead.
- * The automatic undiversion which takes place at end of all input is
- forced into the main output stream.
- Changes which are unlikely to affect existing scripts:
- * `--help' prints an usage summary on standard output. Script execution
- is then inhibited.
- * `--prefix-builtins' (-P) prefixes all builtin macros by `m4_'.
- * Most builtin macros for which arguments are mandatory, called without
- any arguments, are no more recognized as builtin macros: they are
- consequently copied verbatim to the output stream.
- * `define' and `pushdef' are usable with only one argument, they give
- this argument an empty definition.
- * `eval' new operators for binary representation handling: `^' for
- exclusive-or, `~' for the bitwise negation, `<<' and `>>' for shifts.
- * `eval' recognizes the notation 0bDIGITS for binary numbers and the
- notation 0rRADIX:DIGITS for numbers in any radix from 1 to 36.
- Version 1.0.3 - December 1992, by Franc,ois Pinard
- Changes for the user:
- * `dnl' outputs a diagnostic if immediately followed by `('. Usually,
- `dnl' is followed by newline or whitespace.
- * `ifelse' accepts without complaining the common idiom of having only
- one argument. This is useful for introducing long comments.
- * `eval' always expresses values as signed, whatever the radix.
- * M4OPTS environment variable is no longer obeyed.
- * `--no-warnings' option is renamed `--silent'.
- * Debug lines use a new format more compatible with GNU standards.
- * Various bugs have been corrected. See the ChangeLog for details.
- Changes for the installer:
- * GNU m4 now uses an Autoconf-generated configure script, and should be
- more easily portable in many ways. (Cray is not supported yet).
- * `make check' has been made more portable, expect no errors.
- Changes for the programmer:
- * Sources have been fully reindented to comply with GNU standards, and
- cleaned up in many ways.
- * Sources have been protoized. Non-ANSI compilers are automatically
- detected, then sources are unprotoized on the fly before compilation.
- * GNU m4 uses newer versions of obstack, regex, getopt, etc.
- Version 1.0 - October 1991, by Rene' Seindal
- * Uses GNU configure, taken from the gdb distribution.
- * Uses GNU getopt(), with long option names.
- * The -Q/+quiet option is added, which suppresses warnings about missing
- or superflous arguments to built-in macros.
- * Added default options via the M4OPTS environment variable.
- * Several minor bugs have been fixed.
- Version 0.99 - July 1991, by Rene' Seindal
- * The builtins `incr' and `decr' are now implemented without use of
- `eval'.
- * The builtin `indir' is added, to allow for indirect macro calls
- (allows use of "illegal" macro names).
- * The debugging and tracing facilities has been enhanced considerably.
- See the manual for details.
- * The -tMACRO option is added, marks MACRO for tracing as soon as it
- is defined.
- * Builtins are traced after renaming iff they were before.
- * Named files can now be undiverted.
- * The -Nnum option can be used to increase the number of divertions
- available.
- * Calling changecom without arguments now disables all comment handling.
- * A bug in `dnl' is fixed.
- * A bug in the multi-character quoting code is fixed.
- * Several typos in the manual has been corrected. More probably persist.
- Version 0.75 - November 1990, by Rene' Seindal
- * Implemented search path for include files (-I option and M4PATH
- environment variable).
- * Implemented builtin `format' for printf-like formatting.
- * Implemented builtin `regexp' for searching for regular expressions.
- * Implemented builtin `patsubst' for substitution with regular
- expressions.
- * Implemented builtin `esyscmd', which expands to a shell commands output.
- * Implemented `__file__' and `__line__' for use in error messages.
- * Implemented character ranges in `translit'.
- * Implemented control over debugging output.
- * Implemented multi-character quotes.
- * Implemented multi-character comment delimiters.
- * Changed predefined macro `gnu' to `__gnu__'.
- * Changed predefined macro `unix' to `__unix__', when the -G option is
- not used. With -G, `unix' is still defined.
- * Added program name to error messages.
- * Fixed two missing null bytes bugs.
- Version 0.50 - January 1990, by Rene' Seindal
- * Initial beta release.
- ========================================================================
- Local Variables:
- mode: outline
- fill-column: 75
- End:
- Copyright (C) 1992-1994, 2004-2014, 2016 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
- Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
- under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.3 or
- any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no
- Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover
- Texts. A copy of the license is included in the ``GNU Free
- Documentation License'' file as part of this distribution.
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