I'm using Automake.
I have a few source files listed in dist_man1_MANS like this:
dist_man1_MANS = some-file.1 some-other-file.1
Now, Automake + configure eventually generate this in Makefile:
dist_man1_MANS = some-file.1 some-other-file.1
# ...
install-man1: $(dist_man1_MANS)
# generated recipe here
Since I'm not prefixing the .1 files with $(srcdir), I assume that, since I run make from the build directory (its current working directory), it should find them in the build directory.
So, I'm doing an out-of-tree build, for example, in /tmp/build:
/path/to/src/configure --prefix=$(pwd)/install
make
make install
and the build succeeds, that is, make finds the man pages and installs them. They are not in the build directory, however. I add this to the generated Makefile:
install-man1: $(dist_man1_MANS)
#echo ">>> $(^)"
#echo "::: $(dist_man1_MANS)"
# generated recipe here
Now, I would assume that both echos print the same thing, because $^ means the names of all the prerequisites, with spaces between them. To my surprise, the output is:
>>> /path/to/src/some-file.1 /path/to/src/some-other-file.1
::: some-file.1 some-other-file.1
So:
How did make find the /path/to/src/ prefix exactly? Where does it come from in this very context?
Why do $^ and $(dist_man1_MANS) differ?
I found the answer.
Automake sets the VPATH variable in its generated Makefile, a special variable for make, to something like:
VPATH = /path/to/src
From the previous links:
4.5.1 VPATH: Search Path for All Prerequisites
The value of the make variable VPATH specifies a list of directories that make should search. Most often, the directories are expected to contain prerequisite files that are not in the current directory; however, make uses VPATH as a search list for both prerequisites and targets of rules.
So make searches for the some-file.1 and some-other-file.1 prerequisites in the current working directory first, then for /path/to/src/some-file.1 and /path/to/src/some-other-file.1 if it cannot find the first ones. In this case I understand why $^ is different from $(dist_man1_MANS): $^ is the list of effective (resolved) prerequisites.
Related
I read this: Makefile: Copying files with a rule but couldn't do it.
To make it simple, suppose I have two directories dir1 and dir2. Under dir1 I have three files: rabbit.c, tiger.c and bus.c .
I made Makefile like this:
dir2/rabbit.c:dir1/rabbit.c
dir2/tiger.c:dir1/tiger.c
dir2/bike.c:dir1/bike.c
dir2/%:
cp -f $< $#
I specified the prerequisites in three separate lines and specified the unified recipe for the three targets. I expected when I touch any file under dir1, make will copy that file to dir2. But this happend only for rabbit.c. What is wrong?
ADD(after selecting an answer) :
After realizing what's wrong by Takkat's answer, I fixed it and later modified it further and I think this is the correct simplest Makefile for this case.
.PHONY:all
LIST:=rabbit.c tiger.c bike.c
DSTFILES:=$(addprefix dir2/, $(LIST))
all: $(DSTFILES)
dir2/%:dir1/%
cp -f $< $#
Make chooses a default target in your makefile and, unless you specify differently on the command line, it builds just that target (and all prerequisites required to build that target).
The default target in a makefile is, by default, the first explicit target listed.
So in your makefile the first rule is:
dir2/rabbit.c:dir1/rabbit.c
so the first explicit target is dir2/rabbit.c, so that's all make builds.
If you want to build multiple targets by default, you need a first target that lists all the "real" targets as prerequisites; put this line first in your makefile:
all: dir2/rabbit.c dir2/tiger.c dir2/bike.c
and it will work. It's often considered good practice to declare targets like this, which don't relate to real files on the disk, as phony:
.PHONY: all
I am trying to understand a makefile from a project I am working on. It's using automake/autotools and contains this simple rule:
DEPS_SRC = $(shell cd $(srcdir); find . -name '*.ez')
DEPS = $(basename $(DEPS_SRC))
all : $(DEPS)
$(DEPS) : % : %.ez
$(UNZIP) -o $<
Say the directory structure is:
my-app/deps/
build/
When executing make my-app in the build folder the rule will basically unpack *.ez files located in the my-app/deps/ folder into build/my-app/deps/ folder.
I don't know if that's enough information to solve the problem that I am going to explain as I don't know enough about automake/autotools. Please ask if any additional information is needed.
The problem is that I noticed that having the unpacked directory in the source folder prevents make from unpacking the archive in the target folder. For example, given the following structure in the source folder:
my-app/deps/archive1.ez
my-app/deps/archive2.ez
my-app/deps/archive2/
make will only unpack archive1.ez in the build folder:
build/my-app/deps/archive1/
I would like to know if this is a bug in my makefile or a feature of automake. If the later, is there any workaround or setting or variable available to disable it?
This is primarily a GNU make question, not particularly specific to the Autotools. However, since the target system's make is of GNU's flavor (else none of this works), we can assume that the Makefile generated by configure uses GNU make's VPATH feature as part of its support for out-of-source (a.k.a. VPATH) builds such as the one you are performing.
The value of the VPATH variable that configure will have inserted into the Makefile is used as a search path for prerequisites that are not found relative to the build directory. The key point, however, is that it is also used as a search path for rule targets. That makes a certain amount of sense, especially for targets that are prerequisites of other rules.
In your case, however, that leads directly to the behavior you describe:
the default target depends on ./my-app/deps/archive2
resolving that name against the build directory does not produce a valid file name
before attempting to build that target, make looks in the directories listed in the VPATH, which, in your example case, will contain .. or an equivalent
make finds .././my-app/deps/archive2 in this VPATH search, and therefore determines that the specified target already exists, and does not need to be built
Thus, the behavior you observe is normal for GNU make, supposing the Makefile is constructed by Autoconf from an Automake-generated template.
is there any workaround or setting or variable available to disable it?
Do you really need one? If the archive file has already been unpacked in the source tree, then you can expect make to find its contents, too, via the VPATH. At least if the Makefile is well-prepared overall for for out-of-source builds.
But if you want to be certain to get the archive files unpacked in the build directory then you can specify that explicitly. This ought to do it:
DEPS_SRC = $(shell cd $(srcdir); find . -name '*.ez')
DEPS = $(basename $(DEPS_SRC))
LOCAL_DEPS = $(addprefix $(abs_builddir)/,$(DEPS))
all : $(LOCAL_DEPS)
$(LOCAL_DEPS) : $(abs_builddir)/% : %.ez
$(UNZIP) -o $<
That prefixes the name of each dependency with the absolute path to the build directory, and updates the rule for unzipping the archives to accommodate it. Targets with absolute paths such as that cannot be located in the VPATH.
I have a very bizzare problem with GNU make. I have the following files:
a/x.html
b/Makefile
b/c/Makefile
The contents of a/x.html are irrelevant. The contents of b/Makefile are as follows:
SRC=../a
all: x.html
%.html: ${SRC}/%.html
rsync $< $#
The contents of b/c/Makefile are the same, except for the definition of SRC:
SRC=../../a
If I run make in b/c/ the result is as expected:
rsync ../../a/x.html x.html
and x.html gets copied from a/ to b/c/.
However, if I run make in b/ the output I get is several lines of:
make: stat: ../a/../a/.. (repeated many times) ../a/x.html: File name too long
It seems that make is applying the rule for %.html recursively, but why? Is there something obvious I am missing?
To build a target that matches the pattern %.html (i.e. any target name that ends in .html), make applies the rule if it can build the dependency (target built from the original target with ../a/ prepended).
You ask to build x.html. This matches the pattern %.html, so the rule applies: make sees if it can build ../a/x.html.
../a/x.html matches the pattern %.html, so the rule applies: make sees if it can build ../a/../a/x.html.
../../a/x.html matches the pattern %.html, so the rule applies, etc.
The stem character can match any part of a path, including directory separators.
You can see what make is trying by running make -r -d (-d to show debugging output, -r to turn off built-in rules which would cause a huge amount of noise).
When you're in b/c, this stops at step 2 because ../../a/x.html exists but ../../../../a/x.html doesn't.
One way to fix this is to list the files on which you want to act. You can build that list from the list of files that already exist in ../a:
$(notdir $(wildcard ${SRC}/*.html)): %.html: ${SRC}/%.html
rsync $< $#
This has the downside that if the HTML files in ../a are themselves built by a rule in b/Makefile, then running make in b won't built them in a pristine source directory. This shouldn't be a problem though: it would be unusual to have a makefile in b build things outside b.
Another approach which doesn't have this defect is to use an absolute path.
%.html: $(abspath ${SRC})/%.html
rsync $< $#
I'm trying to build several executables in one make instance, as suggested by
Recursive Make Considered Harmful.
The arguments of that paper apply to my project because some of my source files are generated, and go into multiple executables.
The object files for each of these executables go into separate directories, because they are compiled with different preprocessor flags.
How can I specify separate vpath settings for each of these executables, so that source files with duplicate filenames in separate directories go into the executables where I want them to go?
Setting vpath before the rules to build the object files for one executable, and erasing it afterwards (by not giving any directories) doesn't have the desired effect. Apparently, the last setting is used for all the rules.
Solutions I see currently:
Rename source filenames to use unique names so that I can use a global vpath setting
Instead of vpath, use separate rules for each source directory, with the source directory in the prerequisite pattern (*)
Recursive make, with separate vpath settings in each make instance, and somehow deal with the resulting trouble.
Use something different than make.
Is there a better solution, or which one of the above would you prefer?
(*) The solution with separate rules looks like this:
build/$(PROGRAM)/%.o: %.c
$(COMPILE_RECIPE)
build/$(PROGRAM)/%.o: $($(PROGRAM)_SOURCE_DIR)/%.c
$(COMPILE_RECIPE)
Ok for my current project, but would become ugly fast, if there where more than one directory different in the source paths of the executables
Edit: Test for suggestion of #Etan, which shows that $^ is empty, when the prerequisites appear only in pattern rules (y/y.c) - this only works if each dependency is given directly, as for x/x.c.
.PHONY: all
all: build/x.o build/y.o
build/x.o: x/x.c
# the following rule is ignored:
build/%.o: y/%.c
# because there is a matching pattern rule with a recipe:
build/%.o:
#echo \"$#\" from \"$^\"
#touch $#
The files x/x.c, y/y.c and the directory build exist.
output:
"build/x.o" from "x/x.c"
"build/y.o" from ""
Tested with GNU Make 3.82.90
First, it's never correct to use VPATH or vpath to find derived files (files that are built by make)... that includes "source files that are generated" (if they are generated by make, and not before make is invoked somehow). VPATH/vpath can only be used to find source files (files that are not built by make). See How not to use VPATH for more information.
Second, vpath is a global setting, not a per-target setting. Whenever make wants to find a prerequisite and that prerequisite doesn't exist "normally", make will use the vpath settings to find it. There's no facility in vpath to say "for this target use these vpath settings, for that target use those". In an ideal world, you would be able to set VPATH as a target-specific variable but this doesn't work.
There are various ways to generate prerequisites based on a target: you might find some of the suggestions on metaprogramming in make helpful.
Lastly, the makefile example you give regarding $^ is not correct:
# the following rule is ignored:
build/%.o: y/%.c
# because there is a matching pattern rule with a recipe:
build/%.o:
#echo \"$#\" from \"$^\"
#touch $#
You cannot specify a pattern rule without any recipe and have it "add" prerequisite patterns to some other existing pattern rule. It works for explicit rules, to add more prerequisites to a target, but specifying a pattern rule with no recipe simply deletes the pattern rule.
So, $^ is empty for build/y.o because there are no prerequisites defined in the pattern rule and you've not defined any explicit prerequisites for build/y.o like you did for build/x.o.
ETA: The reference to metaprogramming was to suggest that you can use it to make your second option, which is the one I would use, be less typing and easier maintenance. Pick the method you prefer and auto-generate the various pattern rules. This might be termed a "fifth option".
Other than that any of the four you suggest are fine, and there isn't another option you're missing that I'm aware of.
Assume I have a make rule:
.PHONY:gen
gen: auto.template
generate-sources auto.template
that creates a bunch of files, for example auto1.src, auto2.src, auto3.src and so on.
If I now have rules to build targets from *.src files, like this:
$(patsubst %.src,%.target,$(wildcard *.src)): %.target: %.src
build $< > $#
How can I tell make to first execute the gen rule and then expand the preconditions for the second rule template? GNU extensions are welcome.
Note: I would like to keep it in one make invocation; A trivial solution to this would be to put the second rule in a secondary Makefile.secondrun and call $(MAKE) -f Makefile.secondrun after gen was processed. But I was wondering if there is a better option.
Building off Beta's answer, here's how you can do it using makefile remaking in GNU make, which is not the same thing as recursive make. Rather, it updates an included makefile using a rule in the main makefile, then restarts the original make instance. This is how *.d dependency files are typically generated and used.
# Get the list of auto-generated sources. If this file doesn't exist, or if it is older
# than auto.template, it will get built using the rule defined below, according to the
# standard behavior of GNU make. If autosrcs.mk is rebuilt, GNU make will automatically
# restart itself after autosrcs.mk is updated.
include autosrcs.mk
# Once we have the list of auto-generated sources, getting the list of targets to build
# from them is a simple pattern substitution.
TARGETS=$(patsubst %.src,%.target,$(AUTO_SRCS))
all: $(TARGETS)
# Rule describing how to build autosrcs.mk. This generates the sources, then computes
# the list of autogenerated sources and writes that to autosrcs.mk in the form of a
# make variable. Note that we use *shell* constructs to get the list of sources, not
# make constructs like $(wildcard), which could be expanded at the wrong time relative
# to when the source files are actually created.
autosrcs.mk: auto.template
./generate-sources auto.template
echo "AUTO_SRCS=`echo *.src`" > autosrcs.mk
# How to build *.target files from *.src files.
%.target: %.src
#echo 'build $< > $#'
Short answer: you can't. Make determines all of the rules it will have to execute before it executes any rule.
Longer answer: maybe you can. As you say, you can use recursive Make explicitly, or surreptitiously by, say, building a file which your makefile will include (I'm looking at you, Jack Kelly). Or if you could somehow obtain a list of the files which gen will build, you could write a rule around that. Or you could take a leap of faith like this:
%.target: %.src
build $< > $#
%.src: gen;