Re: strange --version issue

Well, I've discovered the problem. (If anyone cares).

Apparently, for whatever reason, the bash shell caches the last known 
location of m4. I had just installed version 1.4.5 in /usr/local, so 
that I could upgrade to autoconf 2.62, but I hadn't yet close my shell 
when I tested the installation.

I was messing around, and renamed the /usr/bin/m4 to get it out of the 
picture, and then bash couldn't find it. So I wondered if it was cached 
by the shell. I started a new shell and this one worked fine.

John

John Calcote wrote:
> Here's some more data on the m4 --version issue.
>
> $ *m4 --version*
> *GNU M4 1.4.4*
> Written by Rene' Seindal.
> ...
>
> $ *strace m4 --version*
> execve("/usr/local/bin/m4", ["m4", "--version"], [/* 68 vars */]) = 0
> ...
> write(1, "GNU M4 1.4.5\n", 13*GNU M4 1.4.5*
> )          = 13
> write(1, "Written by Rene\' Seindal.\n\nCopyr"..., 152Written by Rene' 
> Seindal.
> ...
>
> Running "m4 --version" alone appears to execute the one in /usr/bin 
> (1.4.4), while executing under strace seems to run the correct one in 
> /usr/local/bin (1.4.5).
>
> Again, I'm wondering...
>
> John
>
> John Calcote wrote:
>> Can someone please tell me what the heck is going on here:
>>
>> $ echo $PATH
>> ...:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:...
>> $ ls -al /usr/bin/m4
>> -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 60768 2006-06-16 07:39 /usr/bin/m4
>> $ ls -al /usr/local/bin/m4
>> -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 179252 2008-04-09 08:46 /usr/local/bin/m4
>> $ which m4
>> /usr/local/bin/m4
>> $ /usr/bin/m4 --version
>> GNU M4 1.4.4
>> Written by Rene' Seindal.
>> ...
>> $ /usr/local/bin/m4 --version
>> GNU M4 1.4.5
>> Written by Rene' Seindal.
>> ...
>> $ m4 --version
>> GNU M4 1.4.4
>> Written by Rene' Seindal.
>> ...
>>
>> I'm sure this is not really an m4 question, but I'm totally stumped - 
>> /usr/local/bin comes first in my PATH, yet when I execute "m4 
>> --version" I seem to be picking up the 1.4.4 version in my /usr/bin 
>> directory. What gives?
>>
>> John
>>
>
>