3.4 automake

The automake program can be used to generate ‘Makefile.in’ files suitable for use with a ‘configure’ script generated by autoconf. As automake requires autoconf, this section will assume the use of a ‘configure’ script which uses the AM_PATH_GIMPPRINT macro (there is little point in not using it!).

It is highly recommeded that you use GNU autoconf and automake. They will allow you to make your software build on most platforms with most compilers. automake makes writing complex ‘Makefile’ files very easy, by expressing how to build your packages in terms of what files are required to build a project and the installation locations of the files. It imposes a few limitations over using plain ‘Makefile’ files, such as in the use of conditionals, but these problems are vastly outweighed by the benefits it brings. It also creates many extra targets in the generated ‘Makefile.in’ files such as dist, distcheck, clean, distclean, maintainer-clean and tags, and there are many more more available. See GNU automake: (automake)Top, for more information.

Because AM_PATH_GIMPPRINT calls AC_SUBST to substitute GIMPPRINT_CFLAGS, GIMPPRINT_LIBS and GIMPPRINT_CONFIG, automake will automatically set these variables in the ‘Makefile.in’ files it generates, requiring no additional effort on your part!

As in previous examples, we will make a program prog from a file ‘prog.c’. This is how one might build write a ‘Makefile.am’ to do this:

AUTOMAKE_OPTIONS = 1.4 gnu
MAINT_CHARSET = latin1

@SET_MAKE@

CFLAGS = @CFLAGS@

INCLUDES = @INCLUDES@ $(GIMPPRINT_CFLAGS)

bin_PROGRAMS = prog
prog_SOURCES = prog.c
prog_LDADD = $(GIMPPRINT_LIBS)

MAINTAINERCLEANFILES = Makefile.in

That's all there is to it! Please note that this example also requires the macro AC_PROG_MAKE_SET to be used in ‘configure.in’ and the use of AC_SUBST to substitute CFLAGS and INCLUDES where @CFLAGS@ and @INCLUDES@ are found in the file, respectively.