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VPATH:
Search Path for All Dependencies
The
value of the make
variable, VPATH,
specifies a list of directories that make
should search. Most often, the directories are expected to contain dependency
files that are not in the current directory; however, VPATH
specifies a search list that make
applies for all files, including files which are targets of rules. Thus,
if a file that is listed as a target or dependency does not exist in the
current directory, make searches
the directories listed in VPATH
for a file with that name. If a file is found in one of them, that file
becomes the dependency. Rules may then specify the names of source files
in the dependencies as if they all existed in the current directory. See
Writing
shell commands with directory search. In the VPATH
variable, directory names are separated by colons or blanks. The order
in which directories are listed is the order followed by make
in its search. For example,
VPATH = src:../headers specifies
a path containing two directories, ‘src’
and ‘../headers’,
which make searches in that
order. With this value of VPATH,
the rule, foo.o :
foo.c is interpreted
as if it were written:
foo.o : src/foo.c.
This is assuming the file,
‘foo.c’,
does not exist in the current directory but is found in the directory,
‘src’.
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