Re:Time for Makefiles to Make a Comeback
by vidarh on Tuesday September 05, 2017 @09:20AM
(#15174796)
I agree. I increasingly use makefiles with a small set of common targets. I know I can do "make build" in all my repos, whether they're C or Ruby and whether they're packaged as a docker container or directly. I know I can do "make run". I know if they're in a container I can do "make cli" to get a shell inside that container, and so on.
The Makefile then acts as documentation of exactly what to do. All of the setup stuff that people often put in a README is right there.
All of the complex stuff gets put in other tools or separate scripts. But there's probably going to be a make target that tells people which tool and where to look if they need to change it, or that'll let them run it without having to know the details.
The Makefile then acts as documentation of exactly what to do. All of the setup stuff that people often put in a README is right there.
All of the complex stuff gets put in other tools or separate scripts. But there's probably going to be a make target that tells people which tool and where to look if they need to change it, or that'll let them run it without having to know the details.