Saying that something is obsolete isn't a value judgement -- it's an observation of the differences between the state of the world when it was necessary and now

Saying that something is obsolete isn't a value judgement -- it's an observation of the differences between the state of the world when it was necessary and now. This describes autotools to a 't'. It's not that there are that many fewer build targets these days, but rather that there are many many many fewer installations of most of those build targets these days.