Patched GNU Make 4.2.1 sources to add improved error reporting, tracing, target listing, graph visualization, and profiling. It also contains debugger. See branches remake-4-1 and remake-3-82 for patched GNU Make 4.1 and 3.82 respectively
Tracing and Debugging
Although there's a full debugger here, most of the time I can get by using no options since normal output is a little more verbose and detailed. When that isn't enough, I use the --trace or -x option, e.g:
$ remake -x # ... add other make options
But if you want the full debugger, use --debugger or -X:
$ remake -X # ... add other make options
If you want to get into the debugger only after an error is encountered use --post-mortem:
$ remake --post-mortem # ... add other make options
To enter the debugger from inside a Makefile, use the built-in function $(debugger). For example here is a Makefile:
all:
$(debugger 'arg not used')
echo Nothing here, move along
When GNU Make is inside the all target, it will make a call to the debugger. The string after debugger is not used, but seems to be needed to get parsing right.
Getting Makefile Information
If there is project that you want a list of "interesting" Makefile targets, try:
$ remake --tasks
If the project has commented its Makefile using remake-friendly comments you may get output like this:
ChangeLog # create ChangeLog fom git log via git2cl
build # Do what it takes to build software locally
check # Run all tests
clean # Remove OS- and platform-specific derived files.
dist # Create source and binary distribution
distclean # Remove all derived files. Like "clean" on steroids.
install # Install package
test # Same as check
To get a list of all targets, interesting or not, use --targets instead of --tasks.
To build from a tarball:
$ ./configure && make && make check && sudo make install
To build from git, run first:
$ $SHELL ./autogen.sh
Profiling and Visualization
To profile and get a graph of targets encountered use the --profile
option. For example:
$ remake --profile # target...
remake outputs callgrind profile format data which can be used with kcachegrind or other tools that work with this format.
See also
See also https://github.com/rocky/remake/wiki where there are a couple of demos listed and https://github.com/rocky/remake/blob/master/profile/README.md for infomation on how to profile a "make" run.