Autoconf's suggestion to use bash as /bin/sh

[Earnie Boyd]

Autoconf suggest that so that you can avoid portability issues.  All
shells are not created equal.  Autoconf requires certain assumptions
about the functioning of a shell.  It does try to work around the issues
and version 2.50 does even more to that end.

I suppose Cliff Hones had a question and wasn't just posting to be
posting and I assume the hidden question to be "Why does Cygwin not use
bash as sh?" and that is covered in the FAQ.  However, once upon a time
a long time ago Cygwin did use bash as sh.  It was discovered that
scripts and software builds would happen more quickly if ash was used as
sh.  So the next release of Cygwin after the discovery included ash as
sh.  This doesn't prevent you from using it now, simply `cp
/bin/bash.exe /bin/sh.exe' and you'll be compliant with the autoconf
suggestion.  However, you would have slowed down the functioning of
Cygwin scripts and package builds.

-- 
Earnie.

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