Why Use Make

If you use GNU Make it's worth using my GNU Make Standard Library: http://gmsl.sourceforge.net/ And also reading everything I wrote as Mr. Make: http://blog.jgc.org/2013/02/updated-list-of-my-gnu-make-arti... Or buy my book: http://www.lulu.com/shop/john-graham-cumming/gnu-make-unleas...

Make is an absolutely wonderful, wonderful tool. Most of the common criticisms of Make are actually criticisms of autoconf, which I agree is a hideous tool. (On the other hand, autoconf is a tool intended to address a hideous problem, so perhaps that's inevitable). A lot of the more recent build tools I see are largely reinventions of Make. Make is very widely supported (most basic projects can make do[0] with portable Makefiles, though GNU Make is also available for…

One big reason I rely on Make: its old. Make has been well maintained for nearly 50 years, and is deeply integrated into the programming ecosystem as a whole. I can start a new project that relies on Make, and be extremely confident that Make will continue to work and be maintained for the lifetime of my project. 20+ years from now, Make will still work. My Make knowledge will be relevant for my entire career. New and shiny replacements…

Every time I see a tutorial about makefiles, I'm saddened by the author not going deep enough to show how convenient and versatile make is. Most of the tutorials stop at passing static bunch of files through static set of static rules, with an exception of using few variables, and sometimes with a pattern (implicit rule). But there's so much more, especially in GNU make!