CloudLinux 6 unable to install PECL modules due to old Autoconf version

Symptoms

Attempting to install PECL modules for ALT-PHP versions results in a failure with the message:

configure.ac:12: error: Autoconf version 2.68 or higher is required

Description 

On CloudLinux 6 servers, it was found that PHPIZE for ALT-PHP is configured to utilize the Autotools package provided by the operating system. 

# rpm -q autoconf
autoconf-2.63-5.1.el6.noarch

This is an older version and can cause certain PECL modules to fail to compile. CloudLinux 6 already ships with a newer version of Autotools, however, it appears to not be in use by the PHPIZE configuration.

# rpm -qf /opt/rh/autotools-latest/root/usr/bin/autoconf
autotools-latest-autoconf-2.69-4.el6.cloudlinux.noarch

/opt/cloudlinux/alt-php56/root/usr/bin/phpize:123: test -z "$PHP_AUTOHEADER" && PHP_AUTOHEADER=autoheader
/opt/cloudlinux/alt-php70/root/usr/bin/phpize:122: test -z "$PHP_AUTOCONF" && PHP_AUTOCONF=autoconf

The CloudLinux team has been notified about this.

Workaround

Manually modify the PHPIZE script to ensure the newer Autotools binaries are used.

Example on ALT-PHP70:

Locate the following lines inside the file:

/opt/cloudlinux/alt-php70/root/usr/bin/phpize

For ALT-PHP70, the lines we need to modify are lines 122 & 123:

122: test -z "$PHP_AUTOCONF" && PHP_AUTOCONF=autoconf
123: test -z "$PHP_AUTOHEADER" && PHP_AUTOHEADER=autoheader

Replace them with the following:

122:  test -z "$PHP_AUTOCONF" && PHP_AUTOCONF=/opt/rh/autotools-latest/root/usr/bin/autoconf
123:  test -z "$PHP_AUTOHEADER" && PHP_AUTOHEADER=/opt/rh/autotools-latest/root/usr/bin/autoheader

(Please note that any updates to these packages may overwrite the changes until CloudLinux addresses the issue)