How to detect OS in a make file?

Question

I have a command that works one way in OSX/Unix and another in Debian/Linux. I want to create a make file for my application but need to detect the OS and issue the command accordingly. How would I go about doing this?

possible duplicate of [OS detecting makefile](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/714100/os-detecting-makefile) — Anko - inactive in protest, Dec 19 '13 at 01:00

score 32 · Accepted Answer · answered Feb 14 '12 at 15:55

32

You could use uname to do this. In your Makefile, you could write something like:

OS := $(shell uname)
ifeq $(OS) Darwin
# Run MacOS commands 
else
# check for Linux and run other commands
endif

answered Feb 14 '12 at 15:55

flexlingie

352
2
3

3

How can this code be executed inside of one of the targets? – Mikhail Mar 21 '17 at 19:02

score 19 · Answer 2 · answered Jan 19 '16 at 19:36

19

What worked for me

OS := $(shell uname)
ifeq ($(OS),Darwin)
  # Run MacOS commands
else
  # check for Linux and run other commands
endif

answered Jan 19 '16 at 19:36

Noémien Kocher

1,324
15
17

score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Mar 17 '22 at 18:50

Use uname and an if statement as you do in shell commands, as suggested here.

.PHONY: foo

OS := $(shell uname)

foo:
    @if [ OS = "Darwin" ]; then\
      echo "Hello world";\
    fi
    @if [ OS = "Linux" ]; then\
      echo "Hello world";\
    fi

Note that the closing; and \ at each line are necessary

(This is because make interpret each line as a separate command unless it ends with )

score -1 · Answer 4 · answered Feb 14 '12 at 15:46

-1

Use autotools. It's a standard way of building portable source code packages.

answered Feb 14 '12 at 15:46

bonsaiviking

5,825
1
20
35

How to detect OS in a make file?

4 Answers4