Re: GNU make faults when a semicolon is present in a variable

[Hans-Bernhard Broeker]

M.N. <address@hidden> wrote:
> I am running make 3.79.1 on Windows 2000 which I got from Delorie.com's site
> (DJGPP).  My intent is to compile a .java into a .class file, however the
> javac compiler (JDK1.2.2) that I am using requires multiple JAR files that
> are specified on the -classpath command line be separated by semi-colons.

I.e.  you have a semicolon somewhere in the command part of a
rule. Yes, that'll likely cause problems, with the DJGPP version of
GNU make, because due to its Unix origins which DJGPP tries to emulate
wherever possible, it assumes a ';' to be a command separator, as is
customary for Unix shells.

> When I run make, it fails to interpret the semi-colon that separates MD5.jar
> and jsdk.jar as a literal, and it thinks it's some dependency or some other
> command and it fails to compile my .java file properly. 

Yes, that figures.  One of the possible ways to avoid it was suggested
by Eli Zaretskii in his reply, already: \-escapte the ';'. You may
need the DJGPP version of BASH installed, and a SHELL=/bin/bash style
line in the Makefile to make that work, additionally.

Another way would be to .export the CLASSPATH environment variable
from Make, rather than passing it as a command line argument.

Or you could try to convince Java to accept Unix-style pathnames
(forward slashes, no drive letters, colons as separators) in its
CLASSPATH.
-- 
Hans-Bernhard Broeker (address@hidden)
Even if all the snow were burnt, ashes would remain.