Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/GNU AutoGen


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete as failing WP:N due to failing WP:RS and WP:V. While it appears the tool is widely used, it does not appear to have been widely discussed in reliable sources. Should this change, or should reliable sources supporting notability be found, there is no prejudice against recreation or undeletion of this article. ··· 日本穣 ? · 投稿  · Talk to Nihonjoe ·  Join WP Japan ! 00:22, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

GNU AutoGen

 * – ( View AfD View log )

non notable program, article created by author of said program. Gaijin42 (talk) 22:18, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

There are a number of references to it on wikipedia that have been there for years. It is also a required development tool for GCC. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bkorb (talk • contribs) 22:25, 29 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: this article was sent to AfD 12 minutes after creation. If it's just a problem of notability and doesn't fit any CSD criteria, it may be better for everyone involved to find references and/or wait. §everal⇒|Times 22:37, 29 November 2011 (UTC)


 * [[Image:Symbol keep vote.svg|15px]] Keep — If it's notable enough to keep in French, (fr:GNU_AutoGen), then it's notable enough to keep in English. ~ neko-chan :3 (talk) 22:59, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

AutoGen is also referenced here, and has been for years: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_code_generation_tools though the wiki links were redirected to some automobile company. Cheers - Bruce —Preceding undated comment added 23:15, 29 November 2011 (UTC).
 * Delete: The French article shows no notability also. SL93 (talk) 23:20, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Nice -- I hadn't seen that French page before. Much better than the one I hacked together. I'm kind-of busy at the moment, but when I have a chance, I'll pull its format over for my English page. Thank you! Cheers - Bruce —Preceding undated comment added 23:23, 29 November 2011 (UTC).


 * Delete: really need third-party WP:RS. The Wikipedia comparison-of topic is not useful for this purpose.  The inclusion in gcc sources is interesting, but not every component of gcc itself is notable.  Notability is found where there's an independent reviewer (who is known for being an expert) making note of the topic, or some other in-depth treatment.  We can discuss sources when they're provided TEDickey (talk) 21:39, 30 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Software-related deletion discussions.  —Tom Morris (talk) 01:07, 30 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete. Not even close to notable. Lacks reliable independent secondary sources as required by WP:GNG.  I looked; I don't think there's anything out there.  Furthermore, if you read what this thing does (yawn) it's really not surprising there's nothing to talk about except just man page stuff and, hence, no sources to be found.  Wikipedia is not a manual.  Msnicki (talk) 00:22, 1 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep. RMS was quite impressed ten years ago, but now, the tool is widely used worldwide by package maintainers and looks like a standard to me. AutoGen is part of the GNU project, in terms of notability, there is worse;) IMO, it is important to understand all the plumbing under the covers... Regards. (Genium (talk) 10:57, 5 December 2011 (UTC))
 * The article by Calcote which you cite indicates the opposite - not really used. Google hits have to be taken with caution, since the name of the script could be used for other purposes (and have to take into account duplication).  Likewise, RMS's comments don't indicate that he was "quite impressed" in any sense.  Providing WP:RS is still the recommended way to proceed TEDickey (talk) 12:02, 5 December 2011 (UTC)
 * The article by Calcote shows that it is another common convention to provide a script, often named autogen.sh, that runs all the needed pre-build tools, the point is not his opinion here. "quite impressed" is not the correct wording, English is not my native language sorry ;) RMS semmed to welcome the tool ten years ago, the reference that I gave next shows that the tool is widely used today... (Genium (talk) 14:10, 5 December 2011 (UTC))

Long ago and far away, I proposed generating some of Gnome's code to reduce the duplication they had all over the place. They chose not to do that, but liked the name "autogen" and have been using it for their bootstrap script name ever since.

WRT usage, you won't find direct reference because it is just a development tool. I added it here because it is a GNU project and the GNU project page listed its constituent projects. I figured it worth a couple of words just so as to not have a dead link. So, two fairly well known usages are: Makefile.am generation in GCC and GRUB and option/config file processing in NTP and LilyPond. There are others. But few bother to let me know they are, unless there are problems, and nobody using it puts up a banner saying, "We use AutoGen". It is just a tool. Bkorb (talk) 19:50, 5 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep. autogen is a very commonly used piece of software, used by many other notable software projects. It is part of the GNU build system and is used by virtually every GNU project. Mattl (talk) 21:27, 5 December 2011 (UTC)
 * But assertions that it's useful or contains valuable information aren't compelling arguments in an AfD. To establish notability in an AfD, we need sources.  Have you found any?  Msnicki (talk) 21:36, 5 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Agreed - and the editor promoting the overall category hasn't had much luck sticking to the facts available in the cited sources - not much point in arguing, after reading the editing history.  One would suppose that the topic's author would be able to come up with useful sources - that's what would be most helpful TEDickey (talk) 21:40, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

There are others, but I don't track usage. I respond to issues. There are enough issues that I know it is used. If I introduce a problem, I'll get fairly quick notifications. Bkorb (talk) 21:56, 5 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Eric de Castro Lopo "libsndfile" http://mstation.org/erikdecl.php
 * tcpreplay http://pkgsrc.se/net/tcpreplay
 * GCC - Look at top level Makefile.def and Makefile.tpl, plus the fixincludes component is driven by generated code. (full disclosure -- I rewrote fixincludes)
 * GRUB - very similar (Makefile.tpl and Makefile.def)
 * NTP - contains several programs. They are all configured via AutoGen generated source, both command line options and config files.
 * But WP:RS and WP:Notability don't appear to address who uses a product, but rather focuses on how people who are known for their expertise are making note of it, advising their readers of the pros/cons. For instance, the source citing Calcote did not appear useful, since it focused on something else, more or less dismissing autogen as the way it used to be done, without discussing why autogen was unsatisfactory. TEDickey (talk) 22:03, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

I guess I'm not understanding because the GCC project certainly does use it. fixincludes used to be, for example, a completely unmaintainable horrible mess of a shell script. There were two or three people on the planet who were able to edit the thing and it had to be edited every time there was a significant change in the set of target platforms for GCC. That happens a lot. Using an output template and a file defining the required header file fixes, that all gets generated.


 * the fix definitions: http://gcc.gnu.org/git/gitweb.cgi?p=gcc.git;a=blob_plain;f=fixincludes/inclhack.def;hb=d09fd72c630c4886367f1977cdb366aa82950e32
 * the fix template: http://gcc.gnu.org/git/gitweb.cgi?p=gcc.git;a=blob_plain;f=fixincludes/fixincl.tpl;hb=d09fd72c630c4886367f1977cdb366aa82950e32
 * the fixups as C code: http://gcc.gnu.org/git/gitweb.cgi?p=gcc.git;a=blob_plain;f=fixincludes/fixincl.x;hb=d09fd72c630c4886367f1977cdb366aa82950e32

Doing it that way has made it trivially possible for the port maintainers to manage the fixups without requiring a bottleneck (fixincludes guru)�. Once the GCC maintainers saw that, they applied the technology to the make file issue. I could go on, but I am a bit pressed for time. Thank you Bkorb (talk) 22:50, 5 December 2011 (UTC)


 * It's really quite beside the point whether GCC does or does not use this software. What's needed to establish notability – which is all that matters in an AfD – are reliable independent secondary sources WP:RS.  You don't have them.  Msnicki (talk) 23:07, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

The manual was published 10 yrs ago on this website. AutoGen is listed with the best programming tools... (Genium (talk) 01:31, 7 December 2011 (UTC))


 * The site tells how anyone can submit content - see http://www.linuxselfhelp.com/contribute.html TEDickey (talk) 01:42, 7 December 2011 (UTC)
 * The content for autogen is a copy of its documentation - http://www.linuxselfhelp.com/gnu/autogen/html_chapter/autogen.html TEDickey (talk) 01:43, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

The ALT Linux AutoGen maintainer is Alexey Rusakov. (Genium (talk) 01:46, 7 December 2011 (UTC))
 * The interview doesn't seem to mention that. There are by the way many package maintainers TEDickey (talk) 01:50, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

AutoGen seems to be referenced by the Course Hero online learning platform. (Genium (talk) 02:11, 7 December 2011 (UTC))


 * The webpage says they have "Over 7 million study materials". From the context, it appears that there's no reason to regard a particular item on their webpage as more notable than a Google search TEDickey (talk) 02:19, 7 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Quote from site: "Course Hero hosts the largest online database of study materials with more than 7 million student-uploaded documents from over 4,300 universities around the world. With lecture notes, study guides, textbook help, practice problems and exams, and video lectures, Course Hero has the learning resources you need to excel. Search for materials by school, department, course or professor." TEDickey (talk) 02:20, 7 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.


 * Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, CharlieEchoTango  ( contact ) 06:43, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

 Here are other reliable sources:
 * Re: Makefile questions
 * Re: GNU autogen code generation (Genium (talk) 21:24, 10 December 2011 (UTC))


 * Sources for what? They're random mailing list discussion, not reviews in any sense of the term.  WP:RS goes into a lot of detail - keep the guidelines in mind when offering possible sources to support notability. TEDickey (talk) 23:19, 10 December 2011 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.