makefile-best-practices SKILL.md skillA
makefile-best-practices from air-gapped/skills is an agent skill: a SKILL.md folder an AI agent loads when a task calls for it.
mdr add air-gapped/skills/makefile-best-practices@git:20261027.05ab5e3Pins git:20261027.05ab5e3 in mdr.lock. Pin the fingerprint instead.
- Audit grade
- A, 17 of 17 checks passed
- Kind
- SKILL.md skill
- Repository
- air-gapped/skills
- Path
.claude/skills/makefile-best-practices/SKILL.md- Versions recorded
- 7
- Latest version
- git:20261027.05ab5e3, committed Oct 27, 2026
- First version recorded
- Jul 25, 2026
- Size
- 10,616 bytes
- Repository stars
- 6
- License
- MIT
Makefile best practices, patterns, and templates for GNU Make 4.x — dependency graphs, task-runner workflows, parallel-safe recipes, self-documenting help targets, and language-specific patterns (Go, Python, Node, Docker, Helm, POSIX).
Collected from public GitHub. Every version is saved exactly as it was and never changes. Install it at an exact version with the mdr tool, and every file is checked before it reaches your agent. The main file is checked against the SHA-256 fingerprint recorded here, and the others against the fingerprints GitHub keeps for its source commit. The automatic checks below grade the latest version, and the same checks always give the same file the same grade.
What the file says
# Makefile Best Practices **Target:** GNU Make 4.x. Covers Make as both a build system (dependency-driven compilation) and a task runner (developer workflow automation). **On the `dev` plugin.** Its members are grouped by "general development tooling", not by a shared workflow — this skill has no dependency on **`baml-expert`**, **`jinja-expert`**, or **`transformers-config-tokenizers-expert`**, and none of them on it. Don't hunt for a pipeline that isn't there. The one overlap worth knowing: a Makefile that shells out to render templates is still a Makefile question here, but the template body itself is `jinja-expert`. ## Golden Rules ### 0. Simplicity First - Start with the minimum viable solution; each target does ONE thing well. - Default to <=10 focused targets; expand only on explicit request. ### 1. Make is a Dependency Graph, Not a Script Targets represent outputs; prerequisites represent inputs; recipes transform inputs → outputs. Think graph-first. ```makefile # WRONG: Script thinking - order-dependent, breaks with -j build: compile src/a.c compile src/b.c link # RIGHT: Graph thinking - declares real dependencies program: a.o b.o $(CC) -o $@ $^ %.o: %.c …
Read the whole file at its exact version.
How to install
mdr add air-gapped/skills/makefile-best-practices@sha256:eb6fc345dc4cbfe1The line at the top of this page pins the label git:20261027.05ab5e3, which is what most people want. This one pins the sha256 fingerprint of the contents instead, so it survives a label being moved. Either way the exact version is written to mdr.lock, and mdr install downloads and checks those contents again, so it installs them exactly or stops with an error.
[](https://markdownregistry.com/a/art_o67jvjsrarx7ss3c)
2 badge image fetches in 30 days. What the badge shows.
Versions
The registry has recorded 7 versions of this file, between Jul 25, 2026 and Oct 27, 2026, about one every 16 days.
| version | committed | commit | size | audit | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| git:20261027.05ab5e3 latest | 2026-10-27 | 05ab5e3 | 10,616 B | A | view · diff |
| git:20261003.72f5d9f | 2026-10-03 | 72f5d9f | 10,597 B | A | view · diff |
| git:20260915.34767df | 2026-09-15 | 34767df | 10,591 B | A | view · diff |
| git:20260826.df97b84 | 2026-08-26 | df97b84 | 12,788 B | A | view · diff |
| git:20260826.3447ed0 | 2026-08-26 | 3447ed0 | 13,121 B | A | view · diff |
| git:20260826.6773d8e | 2026-08-26 | 6773d8e | 13,621 B | A | view · diff |
| git:20260725.aef8f18 | 2026-07-25 | aef8f18 | 11,412 B | A | view |
Audit of the latest version
- pass: Frontmatter block present
- pass: Frontmatter declares a name
- pass: Frontmatter declares a description
- pass: Size between 200 bytes and 200 KB (10616 bytes)
- pass: No zero-width or bidi control characters
- pass: No instruction hidden inside an HTML comment
- pass: No link to an exfiltration or paste host
- pass: No credential-shaped string
- pass: No instruction to send local credentials anywhere
- pass: No text hidden with inline styles
- pass: No prompt-injection phrasing
- pass: No curl or wget piped into a shell
- pass: No recursive delete of root, home or parent
- pass: No instruction to read or print local credentials
- pass: No base64 blob over 200 characters
- pass: No link to a raw IP address
- pass: No script tag
Source
air-gapped/skills · 6 stars · license MIT · pushed 2026-11-04 · branch main
API
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/artifacts/art_o67jvjsrarx7ss3c GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/resolve?ref=air-gapped/skills/makefile-best-practices GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/blob/eb6fc345dc4cbfe1f49675f3007366baacbea7f5af4479cee233ad2f7ab18a40
Your AI assistant does the legwork. You hear about the deals worth your word. Hand yours the standing instructions at modelranch.com and it joins the network that reads files like this one.
Guides: the SKILL.md format and its required fields · what to check before you install a skill · how to pin a skill to an exact version · where to find agent skills · keeping a team on the same skills · which agent file does what.