make distcheck and --prefix

[Vincent Bernat]

Hey!

If I configure something with "./configure --sysconfdir=/etc", "make
distcheck" will fail because it will do "./configure --sysconfdir=/etc
--prefix=someotherplace" and expect everything to be installed in
someotherplace. However, if I use something like:

myconfdir = $(sysconfdir)/my
sysconf_DATA = my.conf

make distcheck will fail because it will try to create /etc/my and not
$(prefix)/etc/my. It's possible to teach "make distcheck" to use some
other options:

DISTCHECK_CONFIGURE_FLAGS = $(CONFIGURE_ARGS) \
--with-sysusersdir=no \
--with-systemdsystemunitdir=no \
--with-launchddaemonsdir=no \
--with-apparmordir=no \
--sysconfdir='$$(prefix)/etc'

(the other directories are computed from pkg-config return values).

Why isn't make distcheck not just using DESTDIR instead of --prefix?