There is no clear borderline between both areas.
For example, Gnulib has a facility for generating the name of backup
-files. While this task is entirely at the application level---no
-standard specifies an API for it---the na@"{@dotless{i}}ve code has
+files. While this task is entirely at the application level --- no
+standard specifies an API for it --- the na@"{@dotless{i}}ve code has
some portability problems because on some platforms the length of file
name components is limited to 30 characters or so. Gnulib handles
that.
@section Modules
Gnulib is divided into modules. Every module implements a single
-facility. Modules can depend on other modules.
+facility. Modules can depend on other modules.
A module consists of a number of files and a module description. The
files are copied by @code{gnulib-tool} into the package that will use it,
the @file{m4/} subdirectory. Build scripts reside in the
@file{build-aux/} subdirectory.
-The module description contains the list of files---@code{gnulib-tool}
+The module description contains the list of files --- @code{gnulib-tool}
copies these files. It contains the module's
-dependencies---@code{gnulib-tool} installs them as well. It also
+dependencies --- @code{gnulib-tool} installs them as well. It also
contains the autoconf macro invocation (usually a single line or
-nothing at all)---@code{gnulib-tool} ensures this is invoked from the
+nothing at all) --- @code{gnulib-tool} ensures this is invoked from the
package's @file{configure.ac} file. And also a @file{Makefile.am}
-snippet---@code{gnulib-tool} collects these into a @file{Makefile.am}
+snippet --- @code{gnulib-tool} collects these into a @file{Makefile.am}
for the tailored Gnulib part. The module description and include file
specification are for documentation purposes; they are combined into
@file{MODULES.html}.
@item
It ensures consistency of the used autoconf macros and @file{Makefile.am}
rules with the source code. For example, source code which uses the
-@code{getopt_long} function---this is a common way to implement parsing
-of command line options in a way that complies with the GNU standards---
+@code{getopt_long} function --- this is a common way to implement parsing
+of command line options in a way that complies with the GNU standards ---
needs the source code (@file{lib/getopt.c} and others), the autoconf macro
which detects whether the system's libc already has this function (in
@file{m4/getopt.m4}), and a few @file{Makefile.am} lines that create the
@subsection Enhancements of ISO C or POSIX functions
These are sometimes POSIX functions with GNU extensions also found in
-glibc--examples: @samp{getopt}, @samp{fnmatch}---and often new
-APIs---for example, for all functions that allocate memory in one way
+glibc --- examples: @samp{getopt}, @samp{fnmatch} --- and often new
+APIs --- for example, for all functions that allocate memory in one way
or the other, we have variants which also include the error checking
against the out-of-memory condition.
@subsection Portable general use facilities
-Examples are a module for copying a file---the portability problems
+Examples are a module for copying a file --- the portability problems
relate to the copying of the file's modification time, access rights,
-and extended attributes---or a module for extracting the tail
-component of a file name---here the portability to Woe32 requires a
+and extended attributes --- or a module for extracting the tail
+component of a file name --- here the portability to Woe32 requires a
different API than the classical POSIX @code{basename} function.
@subsection Reusable application code
projects / pspp / commitdiff