Identical Makefile nomenclature for using variable on different build commands with different results - makefile

Question

There are three programs build by this Makefile. They follow the same pattern, but produce different build commands when run. Specifically, I require compilation with c++11 but can only achieve this on one of the build commands. Why is this?
Makefile:
CXX=g++
RM=rm -f
CFLAGS=-std=c++11 -g -Wall $(shell root-config --cflags)
LDFLAGS=-g $(shell root-config --ldflags)
LDLIBS=$(shell root-config --libs)
SOURCES=generic_queue.cpp map_compare.cpp vector_search.cpp
OBJS=$(SOURCES:.cpp=.o)
all: $(SOURCES) generic_queue_test list_of_lists map_compare_test vector_search_test
# Note that $(CFLAGS) is used in the $(CXX) ... command
# each time that a .o file is built.
vector_search_test: $(OBJS) vector_search_test.o
$(CXX) $(LDFLAGS) -o vector_search_test vector_search_test.o $(LDLIBS)
vector_search_test.o: vector_search.cpp vector_search.h
$(CXX) $(CFLAGS) -c vector_search.cpp -o vector_search_test.o
generic_queue_test: $(OBJS) generic_queue_test.o
$(CXX) $(LDFLAGS) -o generic_queue_test generic_queue_test.o $(LDLIBS)
generic_queue_test.o: generic_queue.cpp generic_queue.h fixed_priority_queue.h
$(CXX) $(CFLAGS) -c generic_queue.cpp -o generic_queue_test.o
list_of_lists: $(OBJS) list_of_lists.o
$(CXX) $(LDFLAGS) -o list_of_lists list_of_lists.o $(LDLIBS)
list_of_lists.o: list_of_lists.cpp list_of_lists.h
$(CXX) $(CFLAGS) -c list_of_lists.cpp -o list_of_lists.o
map_compare_test: $(OBJS) map_compare.o
$(CXX) $(LDFLAGS) -o map_compare map_compare.o $(LDLIBS)
map_compare.o: map_compare.cpp map_compare.h
$(CXX) $(CFLAGS) -c map_compare.cpp -o map_compare.o
clean:
$(RM) $(OBJS) generic_queue_test.o list_of_lists.o map_compare.o
dist-clean: clean
$(RM) generic_queue_test list_of_lists map_compare
Output:
g++ -c -o generic_queue.o generic_queue.cpp
g++ -std=c++11 -g -Wall -pthread -m64 -I/usr/include/root -c map_compare.cpp -o map_compare.o
g++ -c -o vector_search.o vector_search.cpp
We see that only the second g++ command fully utilizes CFLAGS variable. Why? Does it have to do with the $(shell ...) portion of the CFLAGS variable?
Edit:
Was able to solve my problem by changing the name of the object file vector_search_test.o to vector_search.o Why did that work?

Answer 1

You have a couple of bugs in your makefile, adding up to this behavior.
First consider OBJS, which contains
generic_queue.o map_compare.o vector_search.o
These files are prerequisites of other targets, but you never actually use generic_queue.o or vector_search.o. Bug #1: you have extra prerequisites by mistake.
These files are prerequisites of other targets, so Make must build them. But how? You have provided rules for three object files:
vector_search_test.o: vector_search.cpp vector_search.h
...
generic_queue_test.o: generic_queue.cpp generic_queue.h fixed_priority_queue.h
...
list_of_lists.o: list_of_lists.cpp list_of_lists.h
...
map_compare.o: map_compare.cpp map_compare.h
...
That last one will do for map_compare.o, but you have given no rules for generic_queue.o or vector_search.o (and there's really no reason you should, since you never use them). But Make knows how to perform certain standard builds, such as foo.cpp => foo.o. If you don't provide a rule, Make will use its implicit rule, which works out to something like this:
generic_queue.o: generic_queue.cpp
$(CXX) $(CPPFLAGS) $(CXXFLAGS) -c generic_queue.cpp -o generic_queue.o
This is very similar to the rules you wrote. In fact, you probably wouldn't have noticed the difference -- and you could have omitted your rules and let Make rely on this one, but Bug #2, you added your flags -std=c++11 -g -Wall whatever to the wrong variable. Make uses CXXFLAGS to hold flags for the C++ compiler; you added yours to CFLAGS, which is for the C compiler.
(I've left out pattern rules and automatic variables since you don't seem to know about them-- I urge you to learn them, they're very useful, but that's for another day.)