(automake-1.16.info)Canonicalization

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3.5 How derived variables are named
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Sometimes a Makefile variable name is derived from some text the
maintainer supplies.  For instance, a program name listed in ‘_PROGRAMS’
is rewritten into the name of a ‘_SOURCES’ variable.  In cases like
this, Automake canonicalizes the text, so that program names and the
like do not have to follow Makefile variable naming rules.  All
characters in the name except for letters, numbers, the strudel (@), and
the underscore are turned into underscores when making variable
references.

   For example, if your program is named ‘sniff-glue’, the derived
variable name would be ‘sniff_glue_SOURCES’, not ‘sniff-glue_SOURCES’.
Similarly the sources for a library named ‘libmumble++.a’ should be
listed in the ‘libmumble___a_SOURCES’ variable.

   The strudel is an addition, to make the use of Autoconf substitutions
in variable names less obfuscating.