[Bug other/122638] makeinfo 4.7 chokes on several texinfo files

[ro at CeBiTec dot Uni-Bielefeld.DE]

https://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=122638

--- Comment #6 from ro at CeBiTec dot Uni-Bielefeld.DE <ro at CeBiTec dot Uni-Bielefeld.DE> ---
> --- Comment #5 from Eric Gallager <egallager at gcc dot gnu.org> ---
> (In reply to ro@CeBiTec.Uni-Bielefeld.DE from comment #2)
>> macOS is a different beast, though: 10.13 and 12 both have ancient 4.8
>> bundled, while 26 apparently doesn't bundle makeinfo any longer.  Given
>> that, I'd suggest 5.0 is fine since one has to build your own anyway.
>> It's Iain's call in the end.
>> 
>> IIRC the makeinfo step is skipped if there's no makeinfo present.  Maybe
>> we should check for a matching version somewhere instead of relying on
>> install.texi alone?
>> 
>> So for me, 5.0 would be perfectly fine and quite reasonable.
>
> Not everyone is on 26 yet, though, so some people might still be on machines
> that have the shipped 4.8 on them. I think bumping the requirement from 4.7 to
> 4.8 would be as far as I'd be comfortable going for the next release.

However, such a requirement and merely documenting it in install.texi is
meaningless unless it's enforced with a version check and makeinfo
treated as missing if too old *and* it's regularly tested that make info
actually works with 4.8.

I certainly won't be doing the latter: as I found when trying, there are
already too many places where it fails right now.  While this can
probably be fixed, someone has to do the work.