GNU Automake

This manual is for GNU Automake (version 1.8.1, 7 January 2004), a program which creates GNU standards-compliant Makefiles from template files.

Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, with the Front-Cover texts being “A GNU Manual,” and with the Back-Cover Texts as in (a) below. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled “GNU Free Documentation License.”

(a) The FSF’s Back-Cover Text is: “You have freedom to copy and modify this GNU Manual, like GNU software. Copies published by the Free Software Foundation raise funds for GNU development.”

1 Introduction
2 General ideas
- 2.1 General Operation
- 2.2 Strictness
- 2.3 The Uniform Naming Scheme
- 2.4 How derived variables are named
- 2.5 Variables reserved for the user
- 2.6 Programs automake might require
3 Some example packages
- 3.1 A simple example, start to finish
- 3.2 A classic program
- 3.3 Building true and false
4 Creating a Makefile.in
5 Scanning configure.ac
- 5.1 Configuration requirements
- 5.2 Other things Automake recognizes
- 5.3 Auto-generating aclocal.m4
- 5.4 aclocal options
- 5.5 Macro search path
- 5.6 Autoconf macros supplied with Automake
  - 5.6.1 Public macros
  - 5.6.2 Private macros
- 5.7 Writing your own aclocal macros
- 5.8 Handling Local Macros
- 5.9 The Future of aclocal
6 The top-level Makefile.am
- 6.1 Recursing subdirectories
- 6.2 Conditional subdirectories
7 An Alternative Approach to Subdirectories
8 Building Programs and Libraries
- 8.1 Building a program
- 8.2 Building a library
- 8.3 Building a Shared Library
- 8.4 Program and Library Variables
- 8.5 Default _SOURCES
- 8.6 Special handling for LIBOBJS and ALLOCA
- 8.7 Variables used when building a program
- 8.8 Yacc and Lex support
- 8.9 C++ Support
- 8.10 Assembly Support
- 8.11 Fortran 77 Support
- 8.12 Java Support
- 8.13 Support for Other Languages
- 8.14 Automatic de-ANSI-fication
- 8.15 Automatic dependency tracking
- 8.16 Support for executable extensions
9 Other Derived Objects
- 9.1 Executable Scripts
- 9.2 Header files
- 9.3 Architecture-independent data files
- 9.4 Built sources
10 Other GNU Tools
- 10.1 Emacs Lisp
- 10.2 Gettext
- 10.3 Libtool
- 10.4 Java
- 10.5 Python
11 Building documentation
- 11.1 Texinfo
- 11.2 Man pages
12 What Gets Installed
- 12.1 Basics of installation
- 12.2 The two parts of install
- 12.3 Extending installation
- 12.4 Staged installs
- 12.5 Rules for the user
13 What Gets Cleaned
14 What Goes in a Distribution
- 14.1 Basics of distribution
- 14.2 Fine-grained distribution control
- 14.3 The dist hook
- 14.4 Checking the distribution
- 14.5 The types of distributions
15 Support for test suites
- 15.1 Simple Tests
- 15.2 DejaGnu Tests
- 15.3 Install Tests
16 Rebuilding Makefiles
17 Changing Automake’s Behavior
18 Miscellaneous Rules
- 18.1 Interfacing to etags
- 18.2 Handling new file extensions
- 18.3 Support for Multilibs
19 Include
20 Conditionals
21 The effect of --gnu and --gnits
22 The effect of --cygnus
23 When Automake Isn’t Enough
24 Distributing Makefile.ins
25 Automake API versioning
26 Frequently Asked Questions about Automake
- 26.1 CVS and generated files
- 26.2 missing and AM_MAINTAINER_MODE
  - 26.2.1 missing
  - 26.2.2 AM_MAINTAINER_MODE
- 26.3 Why doesn’t Automake support wildcards?
- 26.4 Files left in build directory after distclean
- 26.5 Why are object files sometimes renamed?
Appendix A Copying This Manual
- A.1 GNU Free Documentation License
  - A.1.1 ADDENDUM: How to use this License for your documents
Appendix B Indices
- B.1 Macro and Variable Index
- B.2 General Index

automake

GNU Automake

Table of Contents