source: BOOK/final-system/common/m4.xml@ 5832ebe

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<!DOCTYPE sect1 PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook XML V4.4//EN"
  "http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.4/docbookx.dtd" [
  <!ENTITY % general-entities SYSTEM "../../general.ent">
  %general-entities;
]>

<sect1 id="ch-system-m4" role="wrap">
  <?dbhtml filename="m4.html"?>

  <title>M4-&m4-version;</title>

  <indexterm zone="ch-system-m4">
    <primary sortas="a-M4">M4</primary>
  </indexterm>

  <sect2 role="package">
    <title/>

    <para>The M4 package contains a macro processor.</para>

    <segmentedlist>
      <segtitle>&dependencies;</segtitle>

      <seglistitem>
        <seg>Bash, Binutils, Coreutils, Diffutils, GCC,
        Gettext, Glibc, Grep, Make, and Sed</seg>
      </seglistitem>
    </segmentedlist>

  </sect2>

  <sect2 role="installation">
    <title>Installation of M4</title>

    <para os="a">Prepare M4 for compilation:</para>

<screen os="b"><userinput>./configure --prefix=/usr</userinput></screen>

    <para os="c">Compile the package:</para>

<screen os="d"><userinput>make</userinput></screen>

    <para os="e">To test the results, issue:
    <userinput>make check</userinput>.</para>

    <para os="f">Install the package:</para>

<screen os="g"><userinput>make install</userinput></screen>

  </sect2>

  <sect2 id="contents-m4" role="content">
    <title>Contents of M4</title>

    <segmentedlist>
      <segtitle>Installed program</segtitle>

      <seglistitem>
        <seg>m4</seg>
      </seglistitem>
    </segmentedlist>

    <variablelist>
      <bridgehead renderas="sect3">Short Descriptions</bridgehead>
      <?dbfo list-presentation="list"?>
      <?dbhtml list-presentation="table"?>

      <varlistentry id="m4">
        <term><command>m4</command></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>copies the given files while expanding the macros that they
          contain. These macros are either built-in or user-defined and can
          take any number of arguments. Besides performing macro expansion,
          <command>m4</command> has built-in functions for including named
          files, running Unix commands, performing integer arithmetic,
          manipulating text, recursion, etc. The <command>m4</command>
          program can be used either as a front-end to a compiler or as a
          macro processor in its own right.</para>
          <indexterm zone="ch-system-m4 m4">
            <primary sortas="b-m4">m4</primary>
          </indexterm>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>

    </variablelist>

  </sect2>

</sect1>