RFR: 8374642: EscapeHash macro fails with GNU make 4.3 and 4.4

[Tim Bell]

On Wed, 7 Jan 2026 18:23:30 GMT, Erik Joelsson <erikj at openjdk.org> wrote:

> The utility macro `EscapeHash` in Utils.gmk fails when running with GNU make 4.3 and 4.4. The issue seems to be fixed in 4.4.1 where it succeeds again. This failure can be observed by running the vardep tests using:
> 
> 
> make test-make-make-base
> 
> 
> I managed to figure out a workaround to make the macro work on these make versions, by referencing the hash character indirectly. With this fix, the test succeeds with at least GNU make 4.0, 4.2, 4.3, 4.4 and 4.4.1.
> 
> It's not clear if there is any part of the build that currently relies on this macro. This test was modified to include this check a long time ago in JDK 9 when the docs build was rewritten.

Very good

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Marked as reviewed by tbell (Reviewer).

PR Review: https://git.openjdk.org/jdk/pull/29097#pullrequestreview-3636307296