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When I run nmake.exe from make I get this error:

Microsoft (R) Program Maintenance Utility Version 8.00.50727.42
Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.

NMAKE : fatal error U1065: invalid option '-'

But I'm not passing in '-' as an option anyplace.

If I run the same command from outside of make it works correctly.

docwhat
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3 Answers3

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The problem is that the environment variables MAKE and MAKEFLAGS are set by make. These are confusing nmake.exe.

To fix this, just prefix your call to nmake.exe with env -u MAKE -u MAKEFLAGS

Example:

 some-make-target:
      env -u MAKE -u MAKEFLAGS nmake.exe /a /l
docwhat
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    What is this `env` command? It doesn't seem to be a standard cmd command. Are you using another shell for Make on Windows? – Wolfgang Ulmer Oct 20 '15 at 12:50
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    It isn't a windows tool. It's a unix tool that I was using. I'm not sure what the equivalent Windows command would be. `env -u MAKE -u MAKEFLAGS` is unsetting `MAKE` and `MAKEFLAGS` environment variables for that one command only. – docwhat Oct 21 '15 at 17:45
1

Supposing you are on a windows prompt command, and you have a rule like that: 

 target:
   cd ... && nmake.exe ...

by

 target:
   cd ... && set MAKEFLAGS= && nmake.exe ...

set FOO: display the value of FOO if exist, (like echo %FOO%)

set FOO=: unset FOO, (i.e. later call to set FOO will display Environment variable FOO not defined)

note: there is no unset command

Mizux
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0

if you use windows, simply go to Enviroment Variables in advance system setting and delete system variables "MAKEFLAGS". It should not confuse Nmake anymore.

Doni Yusdinar
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