For developers wrestling with the arcane incantations of Autoconf, Automake, and Libtool, Diego Elio Pettenò's Autotools Mythbuster offers a lifeline. This no-nonsense guide transcends typical documentation by focusing squarely on practical outcomes: building reliable, distribution-friendly software packages that pass rigorous open-source repository standards.

Why Autotools Mastery Matters

The GNU build chain remains foundational for thousands of open-source projects despite its notorious learning curve. Poorly implemented build systems lead to broken installations, dependency nightmares, and security vulnerabilities—problems that routinely plague downstream maintainers. Pettenò's guide directly addresses these pain points by:

  • Explaining integrated workflows across Autoconf, Automake, Libtool, and pkg-config
  • Providing battle-tested patterns for dependency resolution and cross-platform compatibility
  • Emphasizing maintainable practices that satisfy Linux distribution packaging requirements

"Instead of providing a full detailing of the workings of the components, which most consumers are not interested in, this guide focuses on building useful, solid and distribution-friendly packages," Pettenò writes in the abstract. This pragmatic approach resonates with developers who need solutions, not academic treatises.

Beyond Theory: Distribution-Ready Results

The guide deliberately avoids exhaustive low-level explanations, instead prioritizing actionable techniques for:

  1. Creating portable configure scripts that handle diverse system environments
  2. Structuring Makefile.am templates for maintainable build logic
  3. Integrating library versioning and installation best practices
  4. Avoiding common pitfalls that trigger distribution package rejections

An eBook edition is available via Amazon, with proceeds funding the project's hosting. The core content remains freely accessible under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 license, preserving its value as a community resource.

For engineers maintaining legacy codebases or launching new C/C++ projects, this guide transforms Autotools from a source of frustration into a strategic asset—proving that even decades-old toolchains deserve precise, practitioner-focused documentation.

Source: Autotools Mythbuster by Diego Elio Pettenò (CC BY-NC-SA 3.0)