File: autoconf.info, Node: Single Suffix Rules, Next: Timestamps and Make, Prev: VPATH and Make, Up: Portable Make 12.19 Single Suffix Rules and Separated Dependencies ==================================================== A “Single Suffix Rule” is basically a usual suffix (inference) rule (‘.from.to:’), but which _destination_ suffix is empty (‘.from:’). “Separated dependencies” simply refers to listing the prerequisite of a target, without defining a rule. Usually one can list on the one hand side, the rules, and on the other hand side, the dependencies. Solaris ‘make’ does not support separated dependencies for targets defined by single suffix rules: $ cat Makefile .SUFFIXES: .in foo: foo.in .in: cp $< $@ $ touch foo.in $ make $ ls Makefile foo.in while GNU Make does: $ gmake cp foo.in foo $ ls Makefile foo foo.in Note it works without the ‘foo: foo.in’ dependency. $ cat Makefile .SUFFIXES: .in .in: cp $< $@ $ make foo cp foo.in foo and it works with double suffix inference rules: $ cat Makefile foo.out: foo.in .SUFFIXES: .in .out .in.out: cp $< $@ $ make cp foo.in foo.out As a result, in such a case, you have to write target rules.