On a platform where building Pd with autotools is just a matter of
hitting ./configure && make, the need for a 'self-replicating' binary
package seems to be obviated indeed. Frankly I didn't know it is so
easy, since INSTALL.txt for 0.48-0 still tells you to generate the
configure script. Will 0.48-1 be different in this respect?
Short form: I an be that easy, but the current pd source tarball does not included the generated configure script.
Long form:
It *should* be that easy but it requires the source release to include the generated configure script. This can be done on a developer machine using "make dist" which generates a distribution tarball (even with the version naming), ready to go. If configure and it's m4 stuff are included, then all the user needs is a shell and compiler chain to build the project. That's part of the whole point of autotools.