Populating empty target file to be tracked in Git

[Matt Darfeuille]

Hi,

From (1):

"but the file’s contents do not matter, and usually are empty."


I need to populate that "empty target" file with  a release version 
given to the Makefile as variable to be used by Git.
What is the best way to populate an "empty target" file?


If my understanding is correct, the '--touch' option will be of no use 
as it will "touch" the "empty target" file and it will never be populated.
How can I make the '--touch' option to the Make utility populate a 
"empty target" file?


$ make -v
GNU Make 4.1
Built for x86_64-pc-linux-gnu

Any help is appriciated.


1)  https://www.gnu.org/software/make/manual/html_node/Empty-Targets.html

--
Matt Darfeuille
Shorewall Project Committee, one of four core members
https://sourceforge.net/p/shorewall/mailman/message/36596609/
shorewall.org