autoconf not generating makefile?

unix configure autoconf
godzilla picture godzilla · Jun 27, 2012 · Viewed 15.4k times · Source

I am currently trying to create an installation package, using autoconf to generate the configure file. I have successfully managed to auto generate these, however, when I run ./configure, no makefile is generated from Makefile.in.

My question is : how do I debug this issue in order to narrow down why it is failing?

The following is the error message I get when attempting to generate the Makefile :

configure: error: cannot find install-sh, install.sh, or shtool

Answer

jkingok picture jkingok · Oct 12, 2012

I had the same problem when I upgraded autotools version, in my case the configure.ac file was missing the following line:

AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE([1.9 foreign])

(Insert whatever version or options you need)

Then run autoreconf --install.

To answer the question about debugging: I went and looked at similar configure.ac files and worked through the differences until the error went way.

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