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From: scott%bgsu.csnet@CSNET-RELAY.ARPA
Newsgroups: net.emacs
Subject: Tacit assumptions that may not be correct in all situations
Message-ID: <5353@mit-eddie.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 21-Sep-85 03:45:29 EDT
Article-I.D.: mit-eddi.5353
Posted: Sat Sep 21 03:45:29 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 22-Sep-85 05:42:01 EDT
Sender: daemon@mit-eddi.UUCP
Organization: MIT, Cambridge, MA
Lines: 35

From: Tom Scott 
	In the $BUILD/etc/Makefile a tacit  assumption is made  to the
effect that $PATH includes the current directory.   Note the following
three lines from $BUILD/etc/Makefile:

	test-distrib: test-distrib.c
		cc -o test-distrib test-distrib.c
		test-distrib

	It might be a little safer to change the third line to read as
follows:

		./test-distrib

	Better safe  than sorry.  If  anyone  finds lines like this in
any other Makefiles, in particular in  the $BUILD/src/Makefile, please
tell me about them.  Thanks.

	I hear some of you grumbling, "Why doesn't  he just define his
PATH variable to include the  current directory?"   That question  can
best be  answered by another  question:  Are you  absolutely sure that
every directory  you `cd' to won't  have some strange executable files
that you might unintentionally execute?  Better safe than sorry.

	A similar  point  can  be  made  about  this   line   from the
$BUILD/src/paths.h.dist file:

	#define PATH_LOADSEARCH ":/usr/local/gnuemacs/lisp"

Watch out for the colon.   I wasted not  a few hours  trying to figure
out why the load-path variable wasn't being set  the way I  thought it
should be  set.  Of course, the  load-path can be  set by  putting the
appropriate (setq  load-path ...) command  in  your $HOME/.emacs file.
But that's not the point.