> but this can't possibly be intended functionality

.....why not?

PHP uses lots of libraries. Each of them need to have a flag that says which directory they are in, which is why you can specify the library location per extension (i.e. --with-libxml-dir, --with-imagick)

I'm pretty sure that prefix is to tell the compilation process where to build files to, not to read them from: "--prefix=PREFIX install architecture-independent files in PREFIX [/usr/local]"

Feel free to explain further if you think this is a bug, or just allow it to close if that's enough explanation.

I wholeheartedly agree, I was a bit fast when writing the ticket. And of course I agree $PREFIX has nothing to do where the compilation scripts looks for deps - my bad.

Is there a reason why it doesn't look in $PATH at all though?

because libraries have no business with PATH at all

I believe the ENV settings for the locations of libraries like `LDFLAGS='-L/home/foo/lib/'` are completely separate from users' PATH setting.

Closing as not a bug then.

I understand. What put me off is that the script calls the binary supplied by libxml2 (xml2-config) which, of course, will not be affected by library paths or include dirs.

In other configuration files I've encounter (e.g. ImageMagick) it does check the PATH for the executable, instead of the hardcoded /usr/local/bin and /usr/bin. To me, checking for the hardcoded paths instead of $PATH seemed less intuitive.

This is the reason I filed the ticket, but if most build systems benefit from hardcoded paths all is good.

Thanks for good responses and all your help!