Re: best way to structure project with an "empty" dir

[Ralf Wildenhues]

Hello John,

please do not top-post, thank you.  (If you don't know what top-posting
means, any search engine does.)

* John Richetta wrote on Wed, Sep 10, 2008 at 01:48:45AM CEST:
> On Sep 9, 2008, at 2:41 PM, Ralf Wildenhues wrote:
>> * John Richetta wrote on Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 11:32:01PM CEST:
>>> I have a project that has a directory structure like this:
[...]
>>> However, the project has traditionally been structured such that the
>>> final executable resides in subdirectories of AppDir, and the actual
>>> source code primarily resides in subdirs of AppDir.
[...]
>> AppDir/Makefile.am:
>> bin_PROGRAMS = A/proggie_one
>> A_proggie_one_SOURCES = B/source1.c A/sub/source2.c ...
>> AUTOMAKE_OPTIONS = subdir-objects

> Unfortunately, due to a last-minute edit in my original message that I 
> failed to review, I misstated something: the (single) built application 
> executable should reside in AppDir, *not* in any of the subdirectories 
> (as my original mail incorrectly stated).  Sorry for the mistake.

No problem.  In this case make it:
AppDir/Makefile.am:
bin_PROGRAMS = proggie_one
proggie_one_SOURCES = B/source1.c A/sub/source2.c ...
AUTOMAKE_OPTIONS = subdir-objects

> Anyway, your solution of simply listing subdirectories in SUBDIRS,  
> without any targets, in the TopDir Makefile did indeed solve my problem.  
> I was already listing them, but assumed I needed to have some form of 
> binary target listed in my Makefile.am.  I'm not sure if this particular 
> point (that a valid Makefile.am need not explicitly list any targets) is 
> as obvious as it might be in the automake documentation.

I'm not sure either.  But I'll recommend Alexandre's autotools tutorial:
<http://www.lrde.epita.fr/~adl/autotools.html>

Cheers,
Ralf