CODEWITHSUNDEEP
makefilegnu-make
Alexey Shiklomanov
Alexey Shiklomanov

Reputation: 1652

Pattern rule for prerequisite regardless of target

I have a Makefile where I use the Rscript command to make a variety of different targets using R scripts.

object.rds: script1.R
    Rscript $<

target.csv: script2.R
    Rscript $<

another.rds: script3.R target.csv object.rds
    Rscript $<

Is there a way to define a universal rule such that any recipe with a file matching the %.R pattern as the first prerequisite always runs Rscript $<? For instance, something like:

**: %.R **
    Rscript $<

I guess the thing I'm looking for is the inverse of a last resort rule -- i.e. a recipe with an arbitrary target but a specific prerequisite (or, at least, one based on a pattern).

(Note that this is not specific to R -- I could ask the exact same question with python, ruby, bash, etc.)

Upvotes: 1

Views: 111

Answers (2)

user657267
user657267

Reputation: 21040

Pattern rules need to match a pattern, if your target filenames have no connection to the Rscript filename you might as well just provide a single recipe for the three targets and specify the dependencies separately

object.rds: script1.R
target.csv: script2.R
another.rds: script3.R target.csv object.rds

object.rds target.csv another.rds:
    Rscript $<

Upvotes: 1

HardcoreHenry
HardcoreHenry

Reputation: 6387

You could create an intermediate target:

 %.R_run: %.R
      Rscript $<

 object.rds: script1.R_run

 target.csv: script2.R_run

 another.rds: script3.R_run target.csv object.rds

Such that object.rds depends on script1.R having been run.

Upvotes: 0

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