In a Makefile, the relative order of variable and rule definitions matters, because variables used in targets are expanded when rules are read. If a variable is used in a target before the variable is changed, the variable's former expansion is used in the target, not the latter expansion.
Current Automake appears to reorder the Makefile.am so that all variable assignments precede all rules, so in a Makefile.am the relative order of variable and rule definitions does not matter. Is this behavior documented? Is it guaranteed to remain in the future? I could not easily find mention of it in the manual, but it is sometimes convenient. Thanks, Ben. -- Ben Pfaff http://benpfaff.org
