Autotools, for all its ugliness, solved a critical problem: getting GNU software up and going on a variety of Unix systems each of which supported a different m

Autotools, for all its ugliness, solved a critical problem: getting GNU software up and going on a variety of Unix systems each of which supported a different mix of features. But it's 2024, people. If you port to Linux, macOS, and Windows, that's cross-platform enough to capture 99% of your userbase, and everything after that is diminishing returns. Still running DEC Ultrix on Alpha, a CPU architecture that's been out of manufacture for literal decades? Maintain the support yourself if it's so important. In conclusion, use cmake or Meson. Let autotools die. Kill them if you have to.