This article spotlights alternative tools to make, a utility which controls the generation of executables and other non-source files of a program from the program’s source files.
The software featured here is free and open source. All tools provide a command-line interface (CLI) unless otherwise stated.
| Alternatives to make | |
|---|---|
| CMake | Build system generator |
| SCons | Software construction tool |
| Maven | Build automation tool used primarily for Java projects |
| Premake | Simple build configuration |
| Ninja | Small build system with a focus on speed |
| just | Save and run project-specific commands |
Other build systems are covered in this roundup.
Are we missing any open source alternatives to make? Please let us know.
All the CLI tools in this series.
| Alternatives to CLI tools |
|---|
| age // awk // bc // cal // cat // cd // chmod // cksum // cloc // cmp // compress // cp // cron // curl // cut // date // dd // df // diff // dig // du // find // ftp // grep // gzip // hexdump // history // jq // kill // less // locate // ls // lsof // make // man // more // mv / ping // ps // psql // rename // rm // sed // split // ssh // strings // sudo // sysctl // talk // tar // telnet // time // top // touch // traceroute // tree // uname // uniq // uptime // vi // watch // Wget // who // whois // xargs |
 Read our complete collection of recommended free and open source software. Our curated compilation covers all categories of software. The software collection forms part of our series of informative articles for Linux enthusiasts. There are hundreds of in-depth reviews, open source alternatives to proprietary software from large corporations like Google, Microsoft, Apple, Adobe, IBM, Cisco, Oracle, and Autodesk. There are also fun things to try, hardware, free programming books and tutorials, and much more. |
Although not really an alternative, there’s autotools., tools designed to assist in making source code packages portable to many Unix-like systems.