Which make? (Unix Power Tools, 3rd Edition)

40.3. Which make?

Many applications and utilities within the Unix environment come as source code that needs to be compiled and installed on your system. Because of this, the make utility is probably the most important utility you have within your Unix toolkit. However, the make utility installed on your system may not necessarily be compatible with the make utility used when the creators tested the software installation.

In fact, one of the problems that can cause the most problems with software installation is that the software compiles cleanly with GNU make but not with other versions of make, because different features of the installation process are supported with GNU make. This happens but not some of the older, more system-specific makes.

For instance, BSD operating systems such as FreeBSD and Darwin, as well as Solaris, have their own version of make in addition to accessibility to GNU make. In some of the systems, such as Darwin, GNU make is installed as the default. In others, such as FreeBSD, BSD make is the default. GNU make is installed but is usually called gmake. This typically isn't a problem because if the compilation fails, try gmake instead:

% gmake install

-- SP