python autoconf macro for building ming extension

[Daniel Nogradi]

It might be slightly off topic here but couldn't find a more suitable
place for this question:

I'm trying to build the python binding for ming -- http://ming.sf.net
-- but for some reason the python macro for autoconf -- python.m4 --
doesn't seem to detect my python installation correctly. The strange
thing is that it seemingly detects everything correctly, but a final
check still fails. I have the python 2.5 source distribution installed
to /usr/local the standard location.

Configuring ming fails with:

checking for python... /usr/local/bin/python
checking for python2.5... (cached) /usr/local/bin/python
checking for a version of Python >= '2.1.0'... yes
checking for the distutils Python package... yes
checking for Python include path... -I/usr/local/include/python2.5
checking for Python library path... -L/usr/local/lib/python2.5 -lpython2.5
checking for Python site-packages path... /usr/local/lib/python2.5/site-packages
checking python extra libraries... -lpthread -ldl -lutil
checking python extra linking flags... -Xlinker -export-dynamic
checking consistency of all components of python development environment... no
configure: error:
  Could not link test program to Python. Maybe the main Python library has been
  installed in some non-standard library path. If so, pass it to configure,
  via the LDFLAGS environment variable.
  Example: ./configure LDFLAGS="-L/usr/non-standard-path/python/lib"
  ============================================================================
   ERROR!
   You probably have to install the development version of the Python package
   for your distribution.  The exact name of this package varies among them.
  ============================================================================


and all variables above are correct. It apparently found

PYTHON_CPPFLAGS=-I/usr/local/include/python2.5
PYTHON_LDFLAGS=-L/usr/local/lib/python2.5 -lpython2.5
PYTHON_SITE_PKG=/usr/local/lib/python2.5/site-packages
PYTHON_EXTRA_LIBS=-lpthread -ldl -lutil
PYTHON_EXTRA_LDFLAGS=-Xlinker -export-dynamic

all correctly, yet the final check fails. I even tried configuring
with PYTHON_NOVERSIONCHECK and LDFLAGS=-L/usr/local/lib/python2.5 and
gave the above environment variables manually but still the same final
check fails.

Apparently it's not a ming but an autoconf issue. Anyone familiar with
python.m4?