How can I install M4 on Linux, avoiding the dependency loop with Automake and Autoconf?

I am trying to install GNU M4 on my Chromebook using the 1.4.17 tarball, but when I run ./configure and thenmake I get an error related to aclocal, which is apparently part of the GNU Automake package. The exact error I get is WARNING: 'aclocal-1.14' is missing on your system. You should only need it if you modified 'acinclude.m4' or 'configure.ac' or m4 files included by 'configure.ac'. The 'aclocal' program is part of the GNU Automake package: It also requires GNU Autoconf, GNU m4 and Perl in order to run: make: *** [aclocal.m4] Error 127 I know the first part is only a warning, but the name indicates that the error is related. I also tried to create an empty file for aclocal.m4, and I get a different message: a warning about automake-1.14 missing and make: *** [Makefile.in] Error 1 Unfortunately, according to the official page , Automake requires Autoconf, which in turn requires M4 . What can I do to install M4 and avoid this problem?