Should I name “makefile” or “Makefile”

coding-stylegnu-makemakefile

Although both names will do the job, what is the correct name for makefiles?

GNU `make' homepage uses Makefile, and I guess it is the good way to name it. Any reasons for typing the front M in upper case ?

Best Answer

What Name to Give Your Makefile chapter of GNU Make manual clarifies it:

By default, when make looks for the makefile, it tries the following names, in order: GNUmakefile, makefile and Makefile. Normally you should call your makefile either makefile or Makefile. (We recommend Makefile because it appears prominently near the beginning of a directory listing, right near other important files such as README.) The first name checked, GNUmakefile, is not recommended for most makefiles. You should use this name if you have a makefile that is specific to GNU make, and will not be understood by other versions of make. Other make programs look for makefile and Makefile, but not GNUmakefile.

Related Solutions

Should a function have only one return statement

I often have several statements at the start of a method to return for "easy" situations. For example, this:

public void DoStuff(Foo foo)
{
    if (foo != null)
    {
        ...
    }
}

... can be made more readable (IMHO) like this:

public void DoStuff(Foo foo)
{
    if (foo == null) return;

    ...
}

So yes, I think it's fine to have multiple "exit points" from a function/method.

The difference between the GNU Makefile variable assignments =, ?=, := and +=

Lazy Set

VARIABLE = value

Normal setting of a variable, but any other variables mentioned with the value field are recursively expanded with their value at the point at which the variable is used, not the one it had when it was declared

Immediate Set

VARIABLE := value

Setting of a variable with simple expansion of the values inside - values within it are expanded at declaration time.

Lazy Set If Absent

VARIABLE ?= value

Setting of a variable only if it doesn't have a value. value is always evaluated when VARIABLE is accessed. It is equivalent to

ifeq ($(origin VARIABLE), undefined)
  VARIABLE = value
endif

See the documentation for more details.

Append

VARIABLE += value

Appending the supplied value to the existing value (or setting to that value if the variable didn't exist)