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People in this thread have already listed the terrible terrible things about make. It succeeds because it's simply everywhere. And rather than attempt to improve, people romanticize the good enough solution.

I dream of a world where a "lessons learned make" is installed everywhere. How do we get that to happen?

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First you have to appreciate that Make isn't as bad as you think it is. If you want to improve on it, then first you will really have to understand it.

That's the pitfall that so many would-be build system authors fall into: _Holy crap, why is it so complicated? Surely something simpler would do the job... [YEARS LATER]... Shit, my build system is so ugly because of all those damn real-world edge cases I've had to fold into it._

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