remctl doesn't build with automake 1.17+

[dehnert]

When I try to build (with automake 1.18.1), I get:

automake: warnings are treated as errors
Makefile.am:82: warning: escaping \# comment markers is not portable
Makefile.am: installing 'build-aux/depcomp'
autoreconf: error: automake failed with exit status: 1

As of automake 1.17 (2024-07-11):

  - Variables using escaped \# will trigger portability warnings, but be
    retained when appended.  GNU Make & BSD Makes are known to support it.
    (bug#7610)

configure.ac has:

AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE([1.11 check-news dist-xz foreign silent-rules subdir-objects
    -Wall -Werror])

Makefile.am has:

        tests/data/acls/val\#id tests/data/acls/val.id                      \

The result of this combination is that the build fails. (Note that I haven't actually tested 1.17, but the error message, Makefile.am line, and NEWS entry seem very suggestive.)

The obvious approaches to me are:

• Drop that test file
• Figure out some other escaping scheme (the automake commit says "POSIX does not provide any way of retaining the # marker in variables." so I'm not sure there is one?)
• drop -Wall -Werror (possibly by ignoring whatever the relevant warning type is, or removing -Werror)

[dehnert]

This patch fixes this, roughly in line with that third proposal, though I'm not sure it's the approach you'd actually want to take:

--- a/configure.ac      2025-08-27 21:08:49.721491608 -0400
+++ b/configure.ac      2025-08-27 21:09:56.113536746 -0400
@@ -14,7 +14,7 @@
 AC_CONFIG_LIBOBJ_DIR([portable])
 AC_CONFIG_MACRO_DIR([m4])
 AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE([1.11 check-news dist-xz foreign silent-rules subdir-objects
-    -Wall -Werror])
+    -Wall -Werror -Wno-portability])
 AM_MAINTAINER_MODE
 
 dnl Detect unexpanded macros.

[rra]

This problem should already be fixed in Git as of cad43fe. Are you testing with that, or with the last release? (I know this is overdue for a new release.)

[dehnert]

Ah, now I see it. Sorry, I was testing with the released version. Seems like it should be fine.