[ 50 character, one line summary ]

[ Description of the changes in this commit. It should be enough
  information for someone not following this development to understand. 
  Lines should be wrapped at about 72 characters. ]

Testing: configure and build - [machine/os, compiler vendor and version]
         unit tests - [pass, not run]
         regression tests - [pass, not run]
         [meta-tests - pass, not run, required if modifying the test driver]