Gnu Makefile - Handling dependencies

Question

What approach do C++ programmers on Unix platform use to create and manage Makefiles?

I was using hand made Makefiles for my projects but they don\'t handle header file

Answer 1

I prefer to use CMake, even though it's not strictly the solution to your problem.

It's a project description language that'll generate your Makefiles, Visual Studio Project, Eclipse Project, KDevelop, etc for you. All the dependencies are done for you:

CMakeLists.txt

add_executable(my_exe file1.c file2.c)
target_link_libraries(my_exe my_library)
add_subdirectory(lib)

In lib/CMakeLists.txt

add_library(my_library file3.c file4.c)

This creates a my_exe from file1.c file2.c linked against my_library. I find this much simpler. It also has things like package discovery:

find_package(Qt4)