Rules in a Makefile

Several types of rules are recognized by the Make program; they can be grouped into two categories: explicit rules and implicit rules. The explicit rules are known as target rules. The implicit rules exist as suffix rules and pattern rules (internally these two types of rules are represented in the same way).

• Explicit Rules
  • Dependencies
  • .ALWAYS
  • .NEVER
  • .ONCE
  • .INVISIBLE
  
  
• Implicit Rules
  • Pattern Rules
  • Suffix Rules
  • Pattern Rules versus Suffix Rules
  
  
• Command Lines
  • Special Commands
  • Variable Assignment Commands
  
  
• Default Target Rule
• Builtin Rules
• User Defined Builtin Rules