Compile Ruby from source on AIX 7.1 - ruby

Question

I am trying to compile Ruby 2.4.5 from source using gcc compiler on AIX 7.1. The configure works fine, but the make fails giving an error C is not a recognized flag. Anybody faced the same issue and managed to compile ruby on AIX 7.1?
Steps followed:
1) ./configure --disable-install-doc CC="gcc" CFLAGS="-maix64 -mminimal-toc" CXX="g++" CXXFLAGS="-maix64 -mminimal-toc" NM="nm -X64" AR="ar -X64" LDFLAGS="-maix64" EXTLDFLAGS=" -- works perfectly fine
2) make - fails with the below error
make: Not a recognized flag: C
usage: make [-einqrst] [-k|-S] [-d[A|adg[1|2]mstv]] [-D variable] [-f makefile] [-j [jobs]] [variable=value ...] [target ...]
make: 1254-004 The error code from the last command is 2.
Stop.
make: 1254-004 The error code from the last command is 2.
Stop.
make: 1254-004 The error code from the last command is 2.
Update :
Switching to GNU make gives the below error:
Making all in man
make[5]: Entering directory '/test/ruby-2.4.5/tst/ext/fiddle/libffi-3.2.1/man'
make[5]: Nothing to be done for 'all'.
make[5]: Leaving directory '/test/ruby-2.4.5/tst/ext/fiddle/libffi-3.2.1/man'
make[5]: Entering directory '/test/ruby-2.4.5/tst/ext/fiddle/libffi-3.2.1'
CC src/prep_cif.lo
CC src/types.lo
CC src/raw_api.lo
CC src/java_raw_api.lo
CC src/closures.lo
CC src/powerpc/ffi_darwin.lo
../../../../ext/fiddle/libffi-3.2.1/src/powerpc/ffi_darwin.c: In function 'ffi_p rep_args':
../../../../ext/fiddle/libffi-3.2.1/src/powerpc/ffi_darwin.c:112:17: warning: un used variable 'abi' [-Wunused-variable]
const ffi_abi abi = ecif->cif->abi;
^
CPPAS src/powerpc/aix.lo
libtool: compile: unable to infer tagged configuration
libtool: compile: specify a tag with `--tag'
Makefile:1335: recipe for target 'src/powerpc/aix.lo' failed
make[5]: *** [src/powerpc/aix.lo] Error 1
make[5]: Leaving directory '/test/ruby-2.4.5/tst/ext/fiddle/libffi-3.2.1'
Makefile:1596: recipe for target 'all-recursive' failed
make[4]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[4]: Leaving directory '/test/ruby-2.4.5/tst/ext/fiddle/libffi-3.2.1'
Makefile:730: recipe for target 'all' failed
make[3]: *** [all] Error 2
make[3]: Leaving directory '/test/ruby-2.4.5/tst/ext/fiddle/libffi-3.2.1'
Makefile:370: recipe for target 'libffi-3.2.1/.libs/libffi_convenience.a' failed
make[2]: *** [libffi-3.2.1/.libs/libffi_convenience.a] Error 2
make[2]: Leaving directory '/test/ruby-2.4.5/tst/ext/fiddle'
exts.mk:212: recipe for target 'ext/fiddle/all' failed
make[1]: *** [ext/fiddle/all] Error 2
make[1]: Leaving directory '/test/ruby-2.4.5/tst'
uncommon.mk:220: recipe for target 'build-ext' failed
make: *** [build-ext] Error 2

Answer 1

The issue is that you are using AIX's built-in copy of make and it does not support the command-line option -C. That option is available in GNU make.
If you run make -v and do not see output like the following then you are not using GNU make:
GNU Make 3.81
Copyright (C) 2006 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
Run the command which make and it will return either /usr/bin/make or /opt/freeware/bin/make (or a similar path outside of /usr/bin):
If it returns /usr/bin/make then you do not have GNU make installed on your system and will need to follow one of several tutorials to get it installed on AIX.
If it returns /opt/freeware/bin/make then you do have GNU make installed, but it's not reflected in $PATH. You can add it to your path temporarily while you compile Ruby by running export PATH=/opt/freeware/bin:$PATH before you run the make command.
Update:
I would encourage you to open a separate question for your current build trouble, since the original question was about the -C flag for make not working on AIX, and now you have a separate question about running GNU make with an entirely different set of issues and possible solutions.
That said, it's possible you may be able to resolve your issue by starting over and running ./configure LIBTOOL='/usr/bin/libtool --tag=CC' (or whatever your path is to libtool). This is based off the following messages:
libtool: compile: unable to infer tagged configuration
libtool: compile: specify a tag with `--tag'
If this doesn't work then you'll probably have to edit the Makefile by looking for those specific invocations of libtool and append --tag=CC to them one by one until you're able to progress beyond these errors.
Both solutions are assuming that the only code being compiled is C. To my knowledge, everything in MRI that needs to be compiled is written in C, but if anything is written in C++ then the libtool invocations would require --tag=CXX. You can read more about tags here.