Bootstrap failed

[Olly Betts]

On Thu, Dec 10, 2020 at 01:49:57PM +0000, Aman wrote:
> What should I do to remove the errors?
> 
> Configuring autoconf
> checking for a BSD-compatible install... /usr/bin/install -c
> checking whether build environment is sane... yes
> checking for a thread-safe mkdir -p... /usr/bin/mkdir -p
> checking for gawk... no
> checking for mawk... mawk
> checking whether make sets $(MAKE)... yes
> checking build system type... x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu
> checking host system type... x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu
> configure: autobuild project... GNU Autoconf
> configure: autobuild revision... 2.69
> configure: autobuild hostname... ubuntu
> configure: autobuild timestamp... 20201210T134401Z
> checking whether /bin/sh -n is known to work... no
> checking for characters that cannot appear in file names... none
> checking whether directories can have trailing spaces... yes
> checking for expr... /usr/bin/expr
> checking for GNU M4 that supports accurate traces... configure: error: no
> acceptable m4 could be found in $PATH.
> GNU M4 1.4.6 or later is required; 1.4.16 or newer is recommended.
> GNU M4 1.4.15 uses a buggy replacement strstr on some systems.
> Glibc 2.9 - 2.12 and GNU M4 1.4.11 - 1.4.15 have another strstr bug.

It sounds like you don't have GNU m4 installed (the output suggests
you're running Ubuntu, and all supported versions of Ubuntu have m4 >=
1.4.16, so it seems m4 is missing rather than too old).

Did you install the list of packages the developer guide gives?

https://xapian-developer-guide.readthedocs.io/en/latest/getting-started/index.html#debian-ubuntu

Cheers,
    Olly