Summary of Options

Here is a table of all the options make understands:

-b

-m

These options are ignored for compatibility with other versions of make.

-B

--always-make

Consider all targets out-of-date. GNU make proceeds to consider targets and their prerequisites using the normal algorithms; however, all these targets are remade, regardless of the status of their prerequisites.

-C dir

--directory=dir

Change to directory dir before reading the makefiles. If multiple -C options are specified, each is interpreted relative to the previous one: -C / -C etc is equivalent to -C /etc. This is typically used with recursive invocations of make (see Recursive Use of make).

-d

Print debugging information in addition to normal processing. The debugging information says which files are being considered for remaking, which file-times are being compared and with what results, which files actually need to be remade, which implicit rules are considered and which are applied--everything interesting about how make decides what to do. The -d option is equivalent to --debug=a (see below).

--debug[=options]

Print debugging information in addition to normal processing. Various levels and types of output can be chosen. With no arguments, print the "basic" level of debugging. Possible arguments are below; only the first character is considered, and values must be comma- or space-separated.

a (all)

All types of debugging output are enabled. This is equivalent to using -d.

b (basic)

Basic debugging prints each target that was found to be out-of-date, and whether the build was successful or not.

v (verbose)

A level above basic; includes messages about which makefiles were parsed, prerequisites that did not need to be rebuilt, etc. This option also enables basic messages.

i (implicit)

Prints messages describing the implicit rule searches for each target. This option also enables basic messages.

j (jobs)

Prints messages giving details on the invocation of specific subcommands.

m (makefile)

By default, the above messages are not enabled while trying to remake the makefiles. This option enables messages while rebuilding makefiles, too. Note that the all option does enable this option. This option also enables basic messages.

-e

--environment-overrides

Give variables taken from the environment precedence over variables from makefiles. See Variables from the Environment.

-f file

--file=file

--makefile=file

Read the file named file as a makefile. See Writing Makefiles.

-h

--help

Remind you of the options that make understands and then exit.

-i

--ignore-errors

Ignore all errors in commands executed to remake files. See Errors in Commands.

-I dir

--include-dir=dir

Specifies a directory dir to search for included makefiles. See Including Other Makefiles. If several -I options are used to specify several directories, the directories are searched in the order specified.

-j [jobs]

--jobs[=jobs]

Specifies the number of jobs (commands) to run simultaneously. With no argument, make runs as many jobs simultaneously as possible. If there is more than one -j option, the last one is effective. See Parallel Execution, for more information on how commands are run. Note that this option is ignored on MS-DOS.

-k

--keep-going

Continue as much as possible after an error. While the target that failed, and those that depend on it, cannot be remade, the other prerequisites of these targets can be processed all the same. See Testing the Compilation of a Program.

-l [load]

--load-average[=load]

--max-load[=load]

Specifies that no new jobs (commands) should be started if there are other jobs running and the load average is at least load (a floating-point number). With no argument, removes a previous load limit. See Parallel Execution.

-n

--just-print

--dry-run

--recon

Print the commands that would be executed, but do not execute them. See Instead of Executing the Commands.

-o file

--old-file=file

--assume-old=file

Do not remake the file file even if it is older than its prerequisites, and do not remake anything on account of changes in file. Essentially the file is treated as very old and its rules are ignored. See Avoiding Recompilation of Some Files.

-p

--print-data-base

Print the data base (rules and variable values) that results from reading the makefiles; then execute as usual or as otherwise specified. This also prints the version information given by the -v switch (see below). To print the data base without trying to remake any files, use make -qp. To print the data base of predefined rules and variables, use make -p -f /dev/null. The data base output contains filename and linenumber information for command and variable definitions, so it can be a useful debugging tool in complex environments.

-q

--question

"Question mode". Do not run any commands, or print anything; just return an exit status that is zero if the specified targets are already up to date, one if any remaking is required, or two if an error is encountered. See Instead of Executing the Commands.

-r

--no-builtin-rules

Eliminate use of the built-in implicit rules (see Using Implicit Rules). You can still define your own by writing pattern rules (see Defining and Redefining Pattern Rules). The -r option also clears out the default list of suffixes for suffix rules (see Old-Fashioned Suffix Rules). But you can still define your own suffixes with a rule for .SUFFIXES, and then define your own suffix rules. Note that only rules are affected by the -r option; default variables remain in effect (see Variables Used by Implicit Rules); see the -R option below.

-R

--no-builtin-variables

Eliminate use of the built-in rule-specific variables (see Variables Used by Implicit Rules). You can still define your own, of course. The -R option also automatically enables the -r option (see above), since it doesn't make sense to have implicit rules without any definitions for the variables that they use.

-s

--silent

--quiet

Silent operation; do not print the commands as they are executed. See Command Echoing.

-S

--no-keep-going

--stop

Cancel the effect of the -k option. This is never necessary except in a recursive make where -k might be inherited from the top-level make via MAKEFLAGS (see Recursive Use of make) or if you set -k in MAKEFLAGS in your environment.

-t

--touch

Touch files (mark them up to date without really changing them) instead of running their commands. This is used to pretend that the commands were done, in order to fool future invocations of make. See Instead of Executing the Commands.

-v

--version

Print the version of the make program plus a copyright, a list of authors, and a notice that there is no warranty; then exit.

-w

--print-directory

Print a message containing the working directory both before and after executing the makefile. This may be useful for tracking down errors from complicated nests of recursive make commands. See Recursive Use of make. (In practice, you rarely need to specify this option since make does it for you; see The --print-directory Option.)

--no-print-directory

Disable printing of the working directory under -w. This option is useful when -w is turned on automatically, but you do not want to see the extra messages. See The --print-directory Option.

-W file

--what-if=file

--new-file=file

--assume-new=file

Pretend that the target file has just been modified. When used with the -n flag, this shows you what would happen if you were to modify that file. Without -n, it is almost the same as running a touch command on the given file before running make, except that the modification time is changed only in the imagination of make. See Instead of Executing the Commands.

--warn-undefined-variables

Issue a warning message whenever make sees a reference to an undefined variable. This can be helpful when you are trying to debug makefiles which use variables in complex ways.