• Checks the C/C++ language syntax for error
• Generates object files
• Command: g++ main.cc -c
• Produces: main.o

• Linking all the source files together, that is all the other object codes in the project.
• Generates the executable file
• Command: g++ main.o -o main
• Produces: main.out (.exe for Windows)

• Debug: -g
• Release: -O0 -O1 -O2 -O3 -Og
• Includes: -I
• Warnings: -Wall -Wextra -Wpedantic -Wconversion

Convention is naming in upper snake_case.

  VARIABLE_NAME = Value

Variables can be called by $(VARIABLE_NAME)

  $(VARIABLE_NAME)

Convention is naming in snake_case or camelCase.

  targetName: Dependecies
    Command

Targets can be called by the make command.

  make targetName

Sometimes you want your Makefile to run commands that do not represent files, for example the "clean" target. You may potentially have a file named clean in your main directory. In such a case Make will be confused because by default the clean target would be associated with this file and Make will only run it when the file doesn't appear to be up-to-date.

.PHONY: clean
clean:
  rm -rf *.o

In terms of Make, a phony target is simply a target that is always out-of-date, so whenever you ask make <phony_target>, it will run, independent from the state of the file system.

Create the executable in either Debug or Release mode.

  make build DEBUG=0 # Build type is debug
  make build DEBUG=1 # Build type is release

Run the executable in either Debug or Release mode.

  make execute DEBUG=0 # Build type is debug
  make execute DEBUG=1 # Build type is release

• Debug Mode: 1 (True) or 0 (False)
• ENABLE_WARNINGS: 1 (True) or 0 (False)
• WARNINGS_AS_ERRORS: 1 (True) or 0 (False)
• CPP_STANDARD: c++11, c++14, c++17, etc.

• $@: the file name of the target
• $<: the name of the first dependency
• $^: the names of all dependencies