Feature request

[Odne Hellebø]

Hey,

I know this probably isn't the right place to ask for a new feature, but 
I couldn't find any decent places to do it, so here goes. I recently 
started using make for a project in java and I know that Java isn't 
supported by default, but I do believe that this is something that will 
benefit other languages as well.

I have A.java which uses B.java and thus the rule becomes this <A.class 
: A.java B.class>, but I don't need to recompile A.java if B.class is 
changed, I just need B.class to be there with the features I use in 
A.class. So what I suggest is that we seperate the prerequisites and the 
"file uses these things" like <A.class : A.java £ B.class>. Where 
everything after £ is just checked to see if it exists. If it doesn't 
then make can go to the <B.class> rule and make it or if it does exist 
make still goes to that rule and updates the file if need be and then 
goes back to <A.class> rule and and only checks the A.java file to see 
if it needs updating.

The closest feature to solving this problem is the make -t from what i 
read. Which changes all the timestamps to the current, but it would be 
easier to just say that we only need this file to be there. Also 
slightly less errorprone in the case where you have changed multiple 
files in your project and then suddenly changed the a B.java file and 
you decide to type <make -t>.

This would also make it faster to compile.

Regards


Odne.

P.S. Anything I can do to help, like small things, would be more than 
happy to.