DESTDIR and PREFIX of make

c linux bash makefile configure
Sean picture Sean · Jul 3, 2012 · Viewed 76.2k times · Source

I am trying to make software install to a specific directory. I found several ways, but not sure what are the differences between them.

  1. ./configure --prefix=***
  2. make install DESTDIR=***
  3. make install prefix=***

I am confused about the functions of these three. Do they achieve the same goal?

Answer

Alan Curry picture Alan Curry · Jul 3, 2012

./configure --prefix=***

Number 1 determines where the package will go when it is installed, and where it will look for its associated files when it is run. It's what you should use if you're just compiling something for use on a single host.

make install DESTDIR=***

Number 2 is for installing to a temporary directory which is not where the package will be run from. For example this is used when building deb packages. The person building the package doesn't actually install everything into its final place on his own system. He may have a different version installed already and not want to disturb it, or he may not even be root. So he uses

./configure --prefix=/usr

so the program will expect to be installed in /usr when it runs, then

make install DESTDIR=debian/tmp

to actually create the directory structure.

make install prefix=***

Number 3 is going to install it to a different place but not create all the directories as DESTDIR=/foo/bar/baz would. It's commonly used with GNU stow via

./configure --prefix=/usr/local && make && sudo make install prefix=/usr/local/stow/foo

, which would install binaries in /usr/local/stow/foo/bin. By comparison,

make install DESTDIR=/usr/local/stow/foo

would install binaries in /usr/local/stow/foo/usr/local/bin.

Related questions

Writing a simple shell in C using fork/execvp

I have to develop a simple shell in C using system calls fork()/execvp(). So far my code takes in a command, splits it up using strtok into an array argv and then I call fork to create a child …

Read More
Serial port loopback/duplex test, in Bash or C? (process substitution)

I have a serial device set up as loopback (meaning it will simply echo back any character it receives), and I'd like to measure effective throughput speed. For this, I hoped I could use time, as in time bash -c …

Read More
How I can find function in shared object files using objdump and bash functions in linux?

I've got a folder in linux, which is contained several shared object files (*.so). How I can find function in shared object files using objdump and bash functions in linux? For instance, the following example is found me function func1 …

Read More