Better error message when make fails to remake -include'd makefiles

[Philippe Blain]

Hello,

 

I searched in the bugs listed on Savannah but couldn’t find anything mentioning that. I have the following Makefile:

$ cat Makefile

a.mk:

@false

-include a.mk

This is just to simulate the case when the recipe for an included Makefile fails. When I run make (4.2.1) with this Makefile it outputs

$ make

make: *** No rule to make target `a.mk'.  Stop.

This is confusing because clearly there is a rule. However, the output of make -rd is 

$ make -rd

GNU Make 4.2.1

...

Must remake target ‘a.mk'

...

Failed to remake target file ‘a.mk'

...

Considering target file 'a.mk’.

Recently tried and failed to update file 'a.mk'.

make: *** No rule to make target 'a.mk'.  Stop

I think that in that case "Recently tried and failed to update file `a.mk’" is a much more useful error message… Would that be hard to add ? 

Thanks,

Philippe Blain.