GNU Make enhansment patch - batching compiles

[Jason Wessel]

Could someone direct me to how an enhansment
can be added to GNU Make?  I can write documentation
and examples for the new feature as well, but I need
to know how the acceptance process works.  So
that I can have this feature incorporated into future
releases of gnu-make.
    
I needed the ability to change a variable from
inside the command section of a rule.  Doing
this allows me to build a list of files that need
to be compiled, instead of passing the files to
the compiler one at a time.  We have a program
that builds the make files already.  The idea is
to feed the compiler multiple source files at the
same time.  The compiler builds the object files 
much more quickly, taking advantage of writing 
object files only when it needs to, and other
optimization when switching between parsing
and code generation.

Attached is a sample make file that works with
my new feature, as well as the context diff
against make 3.79.1.  If you want it in a different
format, please let me know.

Try these commands, after building the new make
with the attached  Makefile.

% touch jason.java mine.java fine.java 
% make               
compiling jason.java fine.java mine.java into outputs
% make nonbatch      
compiling jason.java into jason.class
compiling fine.java into fine.class
compiling mine.java into mine.class

This feature opens the door for a lot of other
strange things someone might want to try :-)

Jason Wessel -- 630-971-6420

make_variable_patch.dat
Description: Binary data

Makefile.dat
Description: Binary data