diff --git a/ChangeLog b/ChangeLog
index a69b77958..afe662dfe 100644
--- a/ChangeLog
+++ b/ChangeLog
@@ -1,3 +1,11 @@
+2010-10-05  Werner Lemberg  <wl@gnu.org>
+
+	Fix Savannah bug #31253.
+	Patch submitted by an anonymous reporter.
+
+	* configure: Use `awk' instead of `sed' to manipulate output of `ls
+	-id'.
+
 2010-10-03  Werner Lemberg  <wl@gnu.org>
 
 	* Version 2.4.3 released.
diff --git a/configure b/configure
index 06fdc8ea7..b39755624 100755
--- a/configure
+++ b/configure
@@ -80,8 +80,8 @@ fi
 
 # build a dummy Makefile if we are not building in the source tree;
 # we use inodes to avoid issues with symbolic links
-inode_src=`ls -id $abs_ft2_dir | sed 's/ .*//'`
-inode_dst=`ls -id $abs_curr_dir | sed 's/ .*//'`
+inode_src=`ls -id $abs_ft2_dir | awk '{print $1}'`
+inode_dst=`ls -id $abs_curr_dir | awk '{print $1}'`
 
 if test $inode_src -ne $inode_dst; then
   if test ! -d reference; then