diff --git a/configure.ac b/configure.ac
--- a/configure.ac
+++ b/configure.ac
@@ -46,6 +46,10 @@ AC_FUNC_MALLOC
 AC_TYPE_PID_T
 AC_TYPE_SIZE_T
 
+# to grab GNU-specific function prototypes for the following functions:
+# getline
+AC_DEFINE([_GNU_SOURCE], [1])
+
 #package dependencies:
 
 PKG_PROG_PKG_CONFIG(0.17.2)
diff --git a/src/server/distrend.c b/src/server/distrend.c
--- a/src/server/distrend.c
+++ b/src/server/distrend.c
@@ -20,11 +20,6 @@
 
 /* This file contains the code which both processes (renders) jobs as a slave, and the code which distributes frames to slaves after receiving them from the client portion of the codebase. */
 
-/*
-  To get getline():
- */
-#define _GNU_SOURCE 1
-
 #include "execio.h"
 #include "options.h"
 #include "distrenjob.h"