On 29 July 2017 at 02:55, Philippe Mathieu-Daudé <f4...@amsat.org> wrote: > Is it necessary to generate this files to run 'make help'? > > $ ./configure > [...] > $ make help > CHK version_gen.h > UPD version_gen.h > DEP util.c > CHK version_gen.h
This happens because we have a rule that says "Makefile: $(GENERATED_FILES)" which is how we ensure that the autogenerated header files are always built before any .c file is compiled. The unfortunate side effect is that we rebuild the generated files before processing *any* makefile target, even those like 'clean' and 'help' that don't actually require them. I did once have a go at fixing this some years back: http://patchwork.ozlabs.org/patch/365288/ but as you'll note from the last comment by me in that mail thread it had a fatal flaw for the "build from clean" case... thanks -- PMM
