bug#73316: Numeric user ID too large when generating the tarball

Hi Karl,

thanks for the detailed answers.
We've run few more tests, and we've found a couple more issues.

1. As you pointed out, TAR_OPTIONS is working fine from the command 
line, but it doesn't work when written inside Makefile.am, neither on 
Mac, nor on Linux.
$ TAR_OPTIONS="--version"
$ export TAR_OPTIONS

2. The workaround we were attempting uses an AS_IF to initialize a 
variable to be used as argument in AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE, but 
AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE is reading that variable as an option. Are we missing 
something regarding the syntax of autotools?

3. Feature request: it would be nice to have a "tar-no-owner" option for 
AM_INIT_AUTOMAKE that sets user and group ids to 0. (The "privileges" 
issue apparently is only when extracting with --same-owner, so intended)

Best,
Giacomo