?procedure for compiling from git

[John Denker <jsd av8n com>]

Hi --

Dumb question:  I'm trying to figure out how to compile
gnumeric and goffice, starting from a freshly cloned git 
repo.

I have gotten as far as figuring out the steps listed below.

However, I am evidently missing a step, because a whole
bunch of make-related files are not getting created.  Could
somebody please tell me the correct incantation for configuring
and compiling stuff, in a freshly-cloned git repo, on a generic 
Ubuntu platform?

The example below mentions goffice, but closely analogous
issues pertain to gnumeric (just different missing files).

I have ways of kludging around the problems, but there
must be a more systematic, reliable, proper procedure.

###################################################
# Here are the almost-correct steps, AFAICT:

:; git clone https://github.com/GNOME/goffice

:; sudo apt-get install libtool automake gtk-doc-tools

:; if ! grep -q AC_CONFIG_MACRO_DIR configure.ac ; then
 awk '{print}   /^AC/{if(!didsome){
   print "AC_CONFIG_MACRO_DIR([m4])";
   didsome++;
}}'  ./configure.ac > /tmp/$$

mv /tmp/$$ ./configure.ac
fi

:; libtoolize --force
### It says:
### libtoolize: Consider adding `-I m4' to ACLOCAL_AMFLAGS in Makefile.am.

:; aclocal
:; autoheader
:; automake --force-missing --add-missing   # many warnings: non-gnu extensions
:; autoconf
:; ./configure --prefix=/usr
:; make
:; make install

Hat tip:

https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?pid=1258673

######################################################

## Uncreated files, using the steps known to me:
  gtk-doc.make
  goffice/Makefile.in
  plugins/Makefile.in
  plugins/plot_barcol/Makefile.in
  plugins/plot_pie/Makefile.in
  plugins/plot_radar/Makefile.in
  plugins/plot_xy/Makefile.in
  plugins/plot_surface/Makefile.in
  plugins/plot_distrib/Makefile.in
  plugins/reg_linear/Makefile.in
  plugins/reg_logfit/Makefile.in
  plugins/smoothing/Makefile.in
  plugins/lasem/Makefile.in
  mmlitex/Makefile.in
  po/Makefile.in.in
  tests/Makefile.in
  tools/Makefile.in
  docs/reference/Makefile.in