New feature request: handling timestamps if a target or a prerequisite file is a link

[Piotr Mienkowski]

I would like to request a new option to be added. When
deciding on uptodateness of a target it should render
make sensitive to a time-stamp on a link rather than a
file this link points to. Another possibility is to
render make sensitive to the time-stamp of a link or a
file it points to whichever is older. Following is a
more detailed explanation why it would be useful.

I'm using make to compile VHDL (V... Hardware
Description Language) source code. All the files are
managed by a proprietary revision control tool similar
to CVS. To save disk space typically every designer's
workarea is populated with links to files which reside
in a common cache repository rather than the files
itself (unfortunately I've never been using CVS so I'm
not sure if it has a similar feature). Here comes the
problem: A file foo.vhdl has two versions 1.1 and 1.2
which where checked in to the revision controlled
system at 10:00 and 14:00 respectively, also created
in the cache at the same time. A designer is
populating his workarea with version 1.1 of file
foo.vhdl at 15:00, a link to the cache is created
than. He runs make and creates a compiled version of
this file at 15:05. Some time later he is populating
his workarea with a new design release, as a
consequence a link to version 1.2 of foo.vhdl file is
created at 15:30. When he runs make for the second
time nothing happens even if the source file is not up
to date any more: version 1.2 of a file foo.vhdl was
created in the cache at 14:00 and is older than a
compiled version of this file created at 15:05. Make
would correctly handle this issue if it was sensitive
to the time-stamp on a link to foo.vhdl created in
designer's workarea at 15:30.

I reckon more people are likely to run into similar
problems thus requested new feature should be
valuable.

Regards,
Piotr

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