WG15 Defect Report Ref: 9945-2-127
Topic: make


This is an approved interpretation of 9945-2:1993.

.

Last update: 1997-05-20


								9945-2-127

 _____________________________________________________________________________

	Topic:                  make 
	Relevant Sections:      6.2.6.1

Defect Report:
-----------------------
	Date: Wed, 14 Jun 1995 15:20:01 -0400
	From: "David J. Fiander" <davidf@mks.com>

Sirs,

I request an interpretation of ISO/IEC 9945-2:1993, section
6.2.6.1: make, Standard Output.  Our reference number is SR-8073.

Lines 322--323 state that "If make is invoked without any work
needing to be done, it shall write a message to standard output
indicating that no action was taken."  My question is, what
exactly is "no work needing to be done"?  Historically, make
would report that no worked needed to be done if there was no
rule associated with either the dependency or with the inference
rules, but would not report the lack of work if there was an
empty rule (ie. a rule consisting only of whitespace).

For example, the makefile

	.POSIX:

	foo: foo.u

when executed with the command

	$ touch foo.u
	$ make foo

would report that foo was up to date, since there is nothing to
do, but the makefile

	.POSIX:

	foo: foo.u ;

would complete silently, because there is something to do, namely
"nothing".


Interpretation response
------------------------

The standard is unclear on this issue, and no conformance distinction can
be made between alternative implementations based on this.  This is being
referred to the sponsor.



Rationale
-------------
None.

Forwarded to Interpretations group: Jun 20 1995
Proposed resolution forwarded: Aug 11 1995
Finalized: Sept 12 1995