Make/makefile progress indication!

Question

Look at this makefile, it has some sort of primitive progress indication (could have been a progress bar).

Please give me suggestions/comments on it!

---

# BUILD is initially undefined
ifndef BUILD

# max equals 256 x's
sixteen := x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
MAX := $(foreach x,$(sixteen),$(sixteen))

# T estimates how many targets we are building by replacing BUILD with a special string
T := $(shell $(MAKE) -nrRf $(firstword $(MAKEFILE_LIST)) $(MAKECMDGOALS) \
            BUILD="COUNTTHIS" | grep -c "COUNTTHIS")

# N is the number of pending targets in base 1, well in fact, base x :-)
N := $(wordlist 1,$T,$(MAX))

# auto-decrementing counter that returns the number of pending targets in base 10
counter = $(words $N)$(eval N := $(wordlist 2,$(words $N),$N))

# BUILD is now defined to show the progress, this also avoids redefining T in loop
BUILD = @echo $(counter) of $(T)
endif

# dummy phony targets

.PHONY: all clean

all: target
    @echo done

clean:
    @rm -f target *.c

# dummy build rules

target: a.c b.c c.c d.c e.c f.c g.c
    @touch $@
    $(BUILD)

%.c:
    @touch $@
    $(BUILD)

---

All suggestions welcome!

Answer 1

This one is less intrusive and more awesome.

ifneq ($(words $(MAKECMDGOALS)),1)
.DEFAULT_GOAL = all
%:
        @$(MAKE) $@ --no-print-directory -rRf $(firstword $(MAKEFILE_LIST))
else
ifndef ECHO
T := $(shell $(MAKE) $(MAKECMDGOALS) --no-print-directory \
      -nrRf $(firstword $(MAKEFILE_LIST)) \
      ECHO="COUNTTHIS" | grep -c "COUNTTHIS")

N := x
C = $(words $N)$(eval N := x $N)
ECHO = echo "`expr " [\`expr $C '*' 100 / $T\`" : '.*\(....\)$$'`%]"
endif

.PHONY: all clean

all: target
        @$(ECHO) All done

clean:
        @rm -f target *.c
#       @$(ECHO) Clean done

target: a.c b.c c.c d.c e.c
        @$(ECHO) Linking $@
        @sleep 0.1
        @touch $@

%.c:
        @$(ECHO) Compiling $@
        @sleep 0.1
        @touch $@

endif