Contents|Index|Previous|Next

Arguments to Specify the Makefile

The way to specify the name of the makefile is with the ‘-f’ or ‘--file’ options (‘--makefile’ also works). For example, ‘-f altmake’ says to use the file ‘altmake’ as the makefile.

If you use the ‘-f’ flag several times and follow each ‘-f’ with an argument, all the specified files are used jointly as makefiles.

If you do not use the ‘-f’ or ‘--file’ flag, the default is to try ‘GNUmakefile’, ‘makefile’, and ‘Makefile’, in that order, and use the first of these three which exists or can be made (see Writing Makefiles).