[PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
header is sometimes stale.

For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
from sources fixes the artifact and the test.

Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
generate-configlist.sh reads by having it use the output of
generate-configlist-deps.sh as a list of dependency files, since Meson
does not have (or want) builtin support for globbing like Make.

Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
---

Notes (benknoble/commits):
    I considered having generate-configlist.sh write its own dependency
    list, which Meson also supports… idk though. Input welcome :)

 generate-configlist-deps.sh | 5 +++++
 meson.build                 | 1 +
 2 files changed, 6 insertions(+)
 create mode 100755 generate-configlist-deps.sh

diff --git a/generate-configlist-deps.sh b/generate-configlist-deps.sh
new file mode 100755
index 0000000000..a873e976b6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/generate-configlist-deps.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,5 @@
+#! /bin/sh
+
+printf '%s\n' \
+  "$MESON_SOURCE_ROOT"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+  "$MESON_SOURCE_ROOT"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
index 3a1d12caa4..4df7caa206 100644
--- a/meson.build
+++ b/meson.build
@@ -720,6 +720,7 @@ endif
 
 builtin_sources += custom_target(
   output: 'config-list.h',
+  depend_files: run_command(meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist-deps').stdout().strip().split('\n'),
   command: [
     shell,
     meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
-- 
2.52.0.rc0.971.g305ecc6b61.dirty

Re: [PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Ben Knoble]

> Le 7 févr. 2026 à 16:59, D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com> a écrit :
> 
> diff --git a/generate-configlist-deps.sh b/generate-configlist-deps.sh
> new file mode 100755
> index 0000000000..a873e976b6
> --- /dev/null
> +++ b/generate-configlist-deps.sh
> @@ -0,0 +1,5 @@
> +#! /bin/sh
> +
> +printf '%s\n' \
> +  "$MESON_SOURCE_ROOT"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +  "$MESON_SOURCE_ROOT"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
> diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
> index 3a1d12caa4..4df7caa206 100644
> --- a/meson.build
> +++ b/meson.build
> @@ -720,6 +720,7 @@ endif
> 
> builtin_sources += custom_target(
>   output: 'config-list.h',
> +  depend_files: run_command(meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist-deps').stdout().strip().split('\n'),
>   
Ah, woops. I renamed the file locally before committing but forgot to update the meson spec. This line should have the obvious change to use the correct filename. Will send a v2 when I get more feedback. 

[PATCH v2] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
header is sometimes stale.

For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
from sources fixes the artifact and the test.

Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
generate-configlist.sh reads by having it use the output of
generate-configlist-deps.sh as a list of dependency files, since Meson
does not have (or want) builtin support for globbing like Make.

Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
---

Notes (benknoble/commits):
    I considered having generate-configlist.sh write its own dependency
    list, which Meson also supports… idk though. Input welcome :)

    This was also built on top of commits [1] on next, but should not depend on
    them despite what base-commit and prerequisite-patch-id say. Indeed, it
    applies cleanly to master @ 3e0db84c88 (Start 2.54 cycle, 2026-02-05).

    [1]: https://lore.kernel.org/git/20260207215924.28863-1-ben.knoble+github@gmail.com/

 generate-configlist-deps.sh | 5 +++++
 meson.build                 | 1 +
 2 files changed, 6 insertions(+)
 create mode 100755 generate-configlist-deps.sh

diff --git a/generate-configlist-deps.sh b/generate-configlist-deps.sh
new file mode 100755
index 0000000000..a873e976b6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/generate-configlist-deps.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,5 @@
+#! /bin/sh
+
+printf '%s\n' \
+  "$MESON_SOURCE_ROOT"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+  "$MESON_SOURCE_ROOT"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
index 3a1d12caa4..eb6a149c9f 100644
--- a/meson.build
+++ b/meson.build
@@ -720,6 +720,7 @@ endif
 
 builtin_sources += custom_target(
   output: 'config-list.h',
+  depend_files: run_command(meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist-deps.sh', check: true).stdout().strip().split('\n'),
   command: [
     shell,
     meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',

Diff-intervalle contre v1 :
1:  b03d70c9f3 ! 1:  c9ae171eed meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
    @@ meson.build: endif
      
      builtin_sources += custom_target(
        output: 'config-list.h',
    -+  depend_files: run_command(meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist-deps').stdout().strip().split('\n'),
    ++  depend_files: run_command(meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist-deps.sh', check: true).stdout().strip().split('\n'),
        command: [
          shell,
          meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',

base-commit: 64333814d3ac6e46b6b9c308a6398a66743a4022
prerequisite-patch-id: 364ba1899740b93be5957262d3583348d030e8fa
-- 
2.52.0.rc0.1018.g3ad6585c12.dirty

Re: [PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Patrick Steinhardt]

On Sat, Feb 07, 2026 at 04:59:17PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
> header is sometimes stale.
> 
> For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
> 4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
> 2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
> it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
> from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
> 
> Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
> generate-configlist.sh reads by having it use the output of
> generate-configlist-deps.sh as a list of dependency files, since Meson
> does not have (or want) builtin support for globbing like Make.
> 
> Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
> ---
> 
> Notes (benknoble/commits):
>     I considered having generate-configlist.sh write its own dependency
>     list, which Meson also supports… idk though. Input welcome :)

I think that would actually be the better approach, also because the
list of files with `run_command()` would only be computed at setup time.
I guess it could look something like the below patch -- please feel free
to reuse it at will.

Thanks!

Patrick

diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
index 75c39ade20..2c93ffc58a 100755
--- a/generate-configlist.sh
+++ b/generate-configlist.sh
@@ -2,10 +2,11 @@
 
 SOURCE_DIR="$1"
 OUTPUT="$2"
+DEPFILE="$3"
 
 if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
 then
-	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
+	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT> [<DEPFILE>]"
 	exit 1
 fi
 
@@ -36,3 +37,9 @@ EOF
 	echo
 	print_config_list
 } >"$OUTPUT"
+
+if test -n "$DEPFILE"
+then
+	printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+	    "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc >"$DEPFILE"
+fi
diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
index dd52efd1c8..03ad7a2152 100644
--- a/meson.build
+++ b/meson.build
@@ -718,11 +718,13 @@ endif
 
 builtin_sources += custom_target(
   output: 'config-list.h',
+  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
   command: [
     shell,
-    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
+    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
     meson.current_source_dir(),
     '@OUTPUT@',
+    meson.current_build_dir() / 'config-list.h.d',
   ],
   env: script_environment,
 )

Re: [PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

Hi Patrick,

> On Sat, Feb 07, 2026 at 04:59:17PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> > The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
> > header is sometimes stale.
> >
> > For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
> > 4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
> > 2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
> > it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
> > from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
> >
> > Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
> > generate-configlist.sh reads by having it use the output of
> > generate-configlist-deps.sh as a list of dependency files, since Meson
> > does not have (or want) builtin support for globbing like Make.
> >
> > Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
> > ---
> >
> > Notes (benknoble/commits):
> >     I considered having generate-configlist.sh write its own dependency
> >     list, which Meson also supports… idk though. Input welcome :)
>
> I think that would actually be the better approach, also because the
> list of files with `run_command()` would only be computed at setup time.

Oh, interesting. I didn't consider that, but it seems that adding a new file
doesn't cause the dependency list to get updated in my version. Good catch

> I guess it could look something like the below patch -- please feel free
> to reuse it at will.
>
> Thanks!
>
> Patrick

[snip patch]

I've applied this locally as so (tinkering since I saw the same symptoms below
with your version):

---- 8< ----
diff --git c/generate-configlist.sh w/generate-configlist.sh
index 75c39ade20..2c93ffc58a 100755
--- c/generate-configlist.sh
+++ w/generate-configlist.sh
@@ -2,10 +2,11 @@
 
 SOURCE_DIR="$1"
 OUTPUT="$2"
+DEPFILE="$3"
 
 if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
 then
-	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
+	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT> [<DEPFILE>]"
 	exit 1
 fi
 
@@ -36,3 +37,9 @@ print_config_list () {
 	echo
 	print_config_list
 } >"$OUTPUT"
+
+if test -n "$DEPFILE"
+then
+	printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+	    "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc >"$DEPFILE"
+fi
diff --git c/meson.build w/meson.build
index 3a1d12caa4..fb5d7367f5 100644
--- c/meson.build
+++ w/meson.build
@@ -720,11 +720,13 @@ endif
 
 builtin_sources += custom_target(
   output: 'config-list.h',
+  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
   command: [
     shell,
-    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
+    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
     meson.current_source_dir(),
     '@OUTPUT@',
+    '@DEPFILE@',
   ],
   env: script_environment,
 )
---- 8< ----

Only, things are behaving oddly. For example:

    λ meson setup build2
    λ ninja -C build2

works fine, but

    λ ls -l build2/config*
    -rw-r--r-- 1 benknoble benknoble 17169  9 févr. 16:39 build2/config-list.h

I don't see the dependency file. Further, re-building seems to get stuck (I get
similar symptoms if I add or remove a relevant config.adoc file, but let's keep
it simple for now):

    λ ninja -C build2
    ninja: Entering directory `build2'
    [1/28] Generating GIT-VERSION-FILE with a custom command (wrapped by meson to set env)

Of course, if I invoke the command myself, I can fix the build:

    λ grep generate-config build2/build.ninja
     COMMAND = /usr/bin/sh /home/benknoble/code/git/generate-configlist.sh /home/benknoble/code/git config-list.h config-list.h.d
    λ (cd build2 && ../generate-configlist.sh .. config-list.h config-list.h.d)
    λ ninja -C build2
    ninja: Entering directory `build2'
    [7/7] Linking target git-upload-pack

but I certainly wouldn't have expected to have to do that!

Interestingly, after the "setup" step, build2/meson-info/intro-targets.json has
this block

  {
    "name": "config-list.h",
    "id": "config-list.h@cus",
    "type": "custom",
    "defined_in": "/home/benknoble/code/git/meson.build",
    "filename": [
      "/home/benknoble/code/git/build2/config-list.h"
    ],
    "build_by_default": false,
    "target_sources": [
      {
        "language": "unknown",
        "compiler": [
          "/usr/bin/sh",
          "/home/benknoble/code/git/generate-configlist.sh",
          "/home/benknoble/code/git",
          "@OUTPUT@",
          "@DEPFILE@"
        ],
        "parameters": [],
        "sources": [],
        "generated_sources": []
      }
    ],
    "extra_files": [],
    "subproject": null,
    "dependencies": [],
    "depends": [],
    "installed": false
  },

which doesn't mention the .d file anywhere. The _only_ reference to it is
build2/build.ninja. This doesn't change (nor are there more references to the
generate-config script) that I can find inside build2/ after any of these steps,
which is odd.

I can't think of any good next debugging steps, so I'm open to ideas on this
oddity.

Re: [PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Patrick Steinhardt]

On Mon, Feb 09, 2026 at 04:50:06PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> > On Sat, Feb 07, 2026 at 04:59:17PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
[snip]
> Only, things are behaving oddly. For example:
> 
>     λ meson setup build2
>     λ ninja -C build2
> 
> works fine, but
> 
>     λ ls -l build2/config*
>     -rw-r--r-- 1 benknoble benknoble 17169  9 févr. 16:39 build2/config-list.h
> 
> I don't see the dependency file.

> Further, re-building seems to get stuck (I get
> similar symptoms if I add or remove a relevant config.adoc file, but let's keep
> it simple for now):
> 
>     λ ninja -C build2
>     ninja: Entering directory `build2'
>     [1/28] Generating GIT-VERSION-FILE with a custom command (wrapped by meson to set env)

With "stuck" you mean that it doesn't do anything, or that it doesn't
actually rebuild?

I guess it kind of makes sense that a new file wouldn't trigger a
rebuild, even though I would have expected a removed one to trigger one.
After all, the dependency file only tracks the set of _existing_ files
so that we know when to rebuild, and of course the dependency file only
gets regenerated in case any of those files changes.

The thing is that build systems like Meson really want to know the list
of files ahead of time so that they can have an optimal build graph. So
we could of course list all the files that we actually depend on. But I
guess that's something we want to avoid?

There's another, alternative approach: you can have a separate build
step that's marked as `build_always_stale: true` that lists all the
config files. This step would then always run, and it would only update
its target file in case any of the files has changed.

Combined with the depfile we'd then rebuild in all cases:

  - When a file gets added or removed, as that would cause the
    `build_always_stale` target to be rewritten.

  - When any of the files changes, because that would cause the
    dependencies in the depfile to change.

Something like the attached patch (note that I don't perform the
necessary changes for the Makefile). I confirmed that it works for all
of the above cases.

Thanks!

Patrick

--- >8 ---

diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
index 75c39ade20..17605e6f77 100755
--- a/generate-configlist.sh
+++ b/generate-configlist.sh
@@ -1,13 +1,6 @@
 #!/bin/sh
 
-SOURCE_DIR="$1"
-OUTPUT="$2"
-
-if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
-then
-	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
-	exit 1
-fi
+set -e
 
 print_config_list () {
 	cat <<EOF
@@ -30,9 +23,50 @@ EOF
 EOF
 }
 
-{
-	echo "/* Automatically generated by generate-configlist.sh */"
-	echo
-	echo
-	print_config_list
-} >"$OUTPUT"
+case "$1" in
+generate)
+	SOURCE_DIR="$2"
+	OUTPUT="$3"
+	DEPFILE="$4"
+
+	if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
+	then
+		echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 generate <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
+		exit 1
+	fi
+
+	if test -n "$DEPFILE"
+	then
+		printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+			"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc >"$DEPFILE"
+	fi
+
+	{
+		echo "/* Automatically generated by generate-configlist.sh */"
+		echo
+		echo
+		print_config_list
+	} >"$OUTPUT"
+	;;
+deps)
+	SOURCE_DIR="$2"
+	OUTPUT="$3"
+
+	if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
+	then
+		echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 deps <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
+		exit 1
+	fi
+
+	TMPFILE=$(mktemp "$OUTPUT".XXXXXX)
+	printf "%s\n" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc | sort >"$TMPFILE"
+
+	if ! test -f "$OUTPUT" || ! cmp "$TMPFILE" "$OUTPUT" >/dev/null
+	then
+		mv "$TMPFILE" "$OUTPUT"
+	else
+		rm "$TMPFILE"
+	fi
+	;;
+esac
diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
index dd52efd1c8..6b9147a39a 100644
--- a/meson.build
+++ b/meson.build
@@ -716,14 +716,29 @@ if not get_option('breaking_changes')
   builtin_sources += 'builtin/pack-redundant.c'
 endif
 
+configlist_deps = custom_target(
+  output: 'config-list.h.deps',
+  command: [
+    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
+    'deps',
+    meson.current_source_dir(),
+    '@OUTPUT@',
+  ],
+  build_always_stale: true,
+)
+
 builtin_sources += custom_target(
   output: 'config-list.h',
   command: [
     shell,
     meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
+    'generate',
     meson.current_source_dir(),
     '@OUTPUT@',
+    '@OUTPUT@.d',
   ],
+  depends: [ configlist_deps, ],
+  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
   env: script_environment,
 )
 

Re: [PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Phillip Wood]

On 11/02/2026 07:42, Patrick Steinhardt wrote:
> On Mon, Feb 09, 2026 at 04:50:06PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
>>> On Sat, Feb 07, 2026 at 04:59:17PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> [snip]
>> Only, things are behaving oddly. For example:
>>
>>      λ meson setup build2
>>      λ ninja -C build2
>>
>> works fine, but
>>
>>      λ ls -l build2/config*
>>      -rw-r--r-- 1 benknoble benknoble 17169  9 févr. 16:39 build2/config-list.h
>>
>> I don't see the dependency file.
> 
>> Further, re-building seems to get stuck (I get
>> similar symptoms if I add or remove a relevant config.adoc file, but let's keep
>> it simple for now):
>>
>>      λ ninja -C build2
>>      ninja: Entering directory `build2'
>>      [1/28] Generating GIT-VERSION-FILE with a custom command (wrapped by meson to set env)
> 
> With "stuck" you mean that it doesn't do anything, or that it doesn't
> actually rebuild?
> 
> I guess it kind of makes sense that a new file wouldn't trigger a
> rebuild, even though I would have expected a removed one to trigger one.
> After all, the dependency file only tracks the set of _existing_ files
> so that we know when to rebuild, and of course the dependency file only
> gets regenerated in case any of those files changes.

If anyone adds a new file under Documentation/config/ they will need to 
update Documentation/config.adoc which should then trigger the rebuild. 
That rebuld will then add the new file to the list of dependencies. If 
they remove a file we should pick that up with the dependencies that are 
already listed.

Do we need to create the depfile when meson is setup? What does meson do 
when the depfile is missing?

> The thing is that build systems like Meson really want to know the list
> of files ahead of time so that they can have an optimal build graph. So
> we could of course list all the files that we actually depend on. But I
> guess that's something we want to avoid?
> 
> There's another, alternative approach: you can have a separate build
> step that's marked as `build_always_stale: true` that lists all the
> config files. This step would then always run, and it would only update
> its target file in case any of the files has changed.

It would be really nice if we can avoid regenerating the depfile with 
every build.

Thanks

Phillip

> Combined with the depfile we'd then rebuild in all cases:
> 
>    - When a file gets added or removed, as that would cause the
>      `build_always_stale` target to be rewritten.
> 
>    - When any of the files changes, because that would cause the
>      dependencies in the depfile to change.
> 
> Something like the attached patch (note that I don't perform the
> necessary changes for the Makefile). I confirmed that it works for all
> of the above cases.
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> Patrick
> 
> --- >8 ---
> 
> diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
> index 75c39ade20..17605e6f77 100755
> --- a/generate-configlist.sh
> +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
> @@ -1,13 +1,6 @@
>   #!/bin/sh
>   
> -SOURCE_DIR="$1"
> -OUTPUT="$2"
> -
> -if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
> -then
> -	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
> -	exit 1
> -fi
> +set -e
>   
>   print_config_list () {
>   	cat <<EOF
> @@ -30,9 +23,50 @@ EOF
>   EOF
>   }
>   
> -{
> -	echo "/* Automatically generated by generate-configlist.sh */"
> -	echo
> -	echo
> -	print_config_list
> -} >"$OUTPUT"
> +case "$1" in
> +generate)
> +	SOURCE_DIR="$2"
> +	OUTPUT="$3"
> +	DEPFILE="$4"
> +
> +	if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
> +	then
> +		echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 generate <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
> +		exit 1
> +	fi
> +
> +	if test -n "$DEPFILE"
> +	then
> +		printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +			"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc >"$DEPFILE"
> +	fi
> +
> +	{
> +		echo "/* Automatically generated by generate-configlist.sh */"
> +		echo
> +		echo
> +		print_config_list
> +	} >"$OUTPUT"
> +	;;
> +deps)
> +	SOURCE_DIR="$2"
> +	OUTPUT="$3"
> +
> +	if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
> +	then
> +		echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 deps <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
> +		exit 1
> +	fi
> +
> +	TMPFILE=$(mktemp "$OUTPUT".XXXXXX)
> +	printf "%s\n" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc | sort >"$TMPFILE"
> +
> +	if ! test -f "$OUTPUT" || ! cmp "$TMPFILE" "$OUTPUT" >/dev/null
> +	then
> +		mv "$TMPFILE" "$OUTPUT"
> +	else
> +		rm "$TMPFILE"
> +	fi
> +	;;
> +esac
> diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
> index dd52efd1c8..6b9147a39a 100644
> --- a/meson.build
> +++ b/meson.build
> @@ -716,14 +716,29 @@ if not get_option('breaking_changes')
>     builtin_sources += 'builtin/pack-redundant.c'
>   endif
>   
> +configlist_deps = custom_target(
> +  output: 'config-list.h.deps',
> +  command: [
> +    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
> +    'deps',
> +    meson.current_source_dir(),
> +    '@OUTPUT@',
> +  ],
> +  build_always_stale: true,
> +)
> +
>   builtin_sources += custom_target(
>     output: 'config-list.h',
>     command: [
>       shell,
>       meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
> +    'generate',
>       meson.current_source_dir(),
>       '@OUTPUT@',
> +    '@OUTPUT@.d',
>     ],
> +  depends: [ configlist_deps, ],
> +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
>     env: script_environment,
>   )
>   
> 

Re: [PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Phillip Wood]

On 11/02/2026 09:44, Phillip Wood wrote:
> On 11/02/2026 07:42, Patrick Steinhardt wrote:
>> On Mon, Feb 09, 2026 at 04:50:06PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
>>>> On Sat, Feb 07, 2026 at 04:59:17PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
>> [snip]
>>> Only, things are behaving oddly. For example:
>>>
>>>      λ meson setup build2
>>>      λ ninja -C build2
>>>
>>> works fine, but
>>>
>>>      λ ls -l build2/config*
>>>      -rw-r--r-- 1 benknoble benknoble 17169  9 févr. 16:39 build2/ 
>>> config-list.h
>>>
>>> I don't see the dependency file.

I've just had a play with this and I don't see the dependency file 
either - I wonder if ninja deletes it after it has read it.

If I delete Documentation/config/add.adoc then config-list.h is rebuilt. 
However if I edit generate-configlist.sh it is not rebuilt - I guess we 
need to add the script to the dependency file.

Thanks

Phillip

>>> Further, re-building seems to get stuck (I get
>>> similar symptoms if I add or remove a relevant config.adoc file, but 
>>> let's keep
>>> it simple for now):
>>>
>>>      λ ninja -C build2
>>>      ninja: Entering directory `build2'
>>>      [1/28] Generating GIT-VERSION-FILE with a custom command 
>>> (wrapped by meson to set env)
>>
>> With "stuck" you mean that it doesn't do anything, or that it doesn't
>> actually rebuild?
>>
>> I guess it kind of makes sense that a new file wouldn't trigger a
>> rebuild, even though I would have expected a removed one to trigger one.
>> After all, the dependency file only tracks the set of _existing_ files
>> so that we know when to rebuild, and of course the dependency file only
>> gets regenerated in case any of those files changes.
> 
> If anyone adds a new file under Documentation/config/ they will need to 
> update Documentation/config.adoc which should then trigger the rebuild. 
> That rebuld will then add the new file to the list of dependencies. If 
> they remove a file we should pick that up with the dependencies that are 
> already listed.
> 
> Do we need to create the depfile when meson is setup? What does meson do 
> when the depfile is missing?
> 
>> The thing is that build systems like Meson really want to know the list
>> of files ahead of time so that they can have an optimal build graph. So
>> we could of course list all the files that we actually depend on. But I
>> guess that's something we want to avoid?
>>
>> There's another, alternative approach: you can have a separate build
>> step that's marked as `build_always_stale: true` that lists all the
>> config files. This step would then always run, and it would only update
>> its target file in case any of the files has changed.
> 
> It would be really nice if we can avoid regenerating the depfile with 
> every build.
> 
> Thanks
> 
> Phillip
> 
>> Combined with the depfile we'd then rebuild in all cases:
>>
>>    - When a file gets added or removed, as that would cause the
>>      `build_always_stale` target to be rewritten.
>>
>>    - When any of the files changes, because that would cause the
>>      dependencies in the depfile to change.
>>
>> Something like the attached patch (note that I don't perform the
>> necessary changes for the Makefile). I confirmed that it works for all
>> of the above cases.
>>
>> Thanks!
>>
>> Patrick
>>
>> --- >8 ---
>>
>> diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
>> index 75c39ade20..17605e6f77 100755
>> --- a/generate-configlist.sh
>> +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
>> @@ -1,13 +1,6 @@
>>   #!/bin/sh
>> -SOURCE_DIR="$1"
>> -OUTPUT="$2"
>> -
>> -if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
>> -then
>> -    echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
>> -    exit 1
>> -fi
>> +set -e
>>   print_config_list () {
>>       cat <<EOF
>> @@ -30,9 +23,50 @@ EOF
>>   EOF
>>   }
>> -{
>> -    echo "/* Automatically generated by generate-configlist.sh */"
>> -    echo
>> -    echo
>> -    print_config_list
>> -} >"$OUTPUT"
>> +case "$1" in
>> +generate)
>> +    SOURCE_DIR="$2"
>> +    OUTPUT="$3"
>> +    DEPFILE="$4"
>> +
>> +    if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z 
>> "$OUTPUT"
>> +    then
>> +        echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 generate <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
>> +        exit 1
>> +    fi
>> +
>> +    if test -n "$DEPFILE"
>> +    then
>> +        printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/ 
>> *config.adoc \
>> +            "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc >"$DEPFILE"
>> +    fi
>> +
>> +    {
>> +        echo "/* Automatically generated by generate-configlist.sh */"
>> +        echo
>> +        echo
>> +        print_config_list
>> +    } >"$OUTPUT"
>> +    ;;
>> +deps)
>> +    SOURCE_DIR="$2"
>> +    OUTPUT="$3"
>> +
>> +    if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z 
>> "$OUTPUT"
>> +    then
>> +        echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 deps <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
>> +        exit 1
>> +    fi
>> +
>> +    TMPFILE=$(mktemp "$OUTPUT".XXXXXX)
>> +    printf "%s\n" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
>> +        "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc | sort >"$TMPFILE"
>> +
>> +    if ! test -f "$OUTPUT" || ! cmp "$TMPFILE" "$OUTPUT" >/dev/null
>> +    then
>> +        mv "$TMPFILE" "$OUTPUT"
>> +    else
>> +        rm "$TMPFILE"
>> +    fi
>> +    ;;
>> +esac
>> diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
>> index dd52efd1c8..6b9147a39a 100644
>> --- a/meson.build
>> +++ b/meson.build
>> @@ -716,14 +716,29 @@ if not get_option('breaking_changes')
>>     builtin_sources += 'builtin/pack-redundant.c'
>>   endif
>> +configlist_deps = custom_target(
>> +  output: 'config-list.h.deps',
>> +  command: [
>> +    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
>> +    'deps',
>> +    meson.current_source_dir(),
>> +    '@OUTPUT@',
>> +  ],
>> +  build_always_stale: true,
>> +)
>> +
>>   builtin_sources += custom_target(
>>     output: 'config-list.h',
>>     command: [
>>       shell,
>>       meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
>> +    'generate',
>>       meson.current_source_dir(),
>>       '@OUTPUT@',
>> +    '@OUTPUT@.d',
>>     ],
>> +  depends: [ configlist_deps, ],
>> +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
>>     env: script_environment,
>>   )
>>
> 

Re: [PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Patrick Steinhardt]

On Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 09:44:48AM +0000, Phillip Wood wrote:
> On 11/02/2026 07:42, Patrick Steinhardt wrote:
> > On Mon, Feb 09, 2026 at 04:50:06PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> > > > On Sat, Feb 07, 2026 at 04:59:17PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> > [snip]
> > > Only, things are behaving oddly. For example:
> > > 
> > >      λ meson setup build2
> > >      λ ninja -C build2
> > > 
> > > works fine, but
> > > 
> > >      λ ls -l build2/config*
> > >      -rw-r--r-- 1 benknoble benknoble 17169  9 févr. 16:39 build2/config-list.h
> > > 
> > > I don't see the dependency file.
> > 
> > > Further, re-building seems to get stuck (I get
> > > similar symptoms if I add or remove a relevant config.adoc file, but let's keep
> > > it simple for now):
> > > 
> > >      λ ninja -C build2
> > >      ninja: Entering directory `build2'
> > >      [1/28] Generating GIT-VERSION-FILE with a custom command (wrapped by meson to set env)
> > 
> > With "stuck" you mean that it doesn't do anything, or that it doesn't
> > actually rebuild?
> > 
> > I guess it kind of makes sense that a new file wouldn't trigger a
> > rebuild, even though I would have expected a removed one to trigger one.
> > After all, the dependency file only tracks the set of _existing_ files
> > so that we know when to rebuild, and of course the dependency file only
> > gets regenerated in case any of those files changes.
> 
> If anyone adds a new file under Documentation/config/ they will need to
> update Documentation/config.adoc which should then trigger the rebuild. That
> rebuld will then add the new file to the list of dependencies. If they
> remove a file we should pick that up with the dependencies that are already
> listed.

Oh? Well, if that's the case then the additional changes should indeed
not be required.

> Do we need to create the depfile when meson is setup? What does meson do
> when the depfile is missing?

The first diff I sent already takes care of generating the depfile. I
guess the complaint was that simply removing/adding a file didn't cause
a rebuild, but based on your finding that's not an issue if folks would
have to modify "config.adoc" anyway.

> > The thing is that build systems like Meson really want to know the list
> > of files ahead of time so that they can have an optimal build graph. So
> > we could of course list all the files that we actually depend on. But I
> > guess that's something we want to avoid?
> > 
> > There's another, alternative approach: you can have a separate build
> > step that's marked as `build_always_stale: true` that lists all the
> > config files. This step would then always run, and it would only update
> > its target file in case any of the files has changed.
> 
> It would be really nice if we can avoid regenerating the depfile with every
> build.

Agreed. So maybe the first patch I sent is sufficient after all?

Thanks!

Patrick

Re: [PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Patrick Steinhardt]

On Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 10:57:10AM +0000, Phillip Wood wrote:
> On 11/02/2026 09:44, Phillip Wood wrote:
> > On 11/02/2026 07:42, Patrick Steinhardt wrote:
> > > On Mon, Feb 09, 2026 at 04:50:06PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> > > > > On Sat, Feb 07, 2026 at 04:59:17PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> > > [snip]
> > > > Only, things are behaving oddly. For example:
> > > > 
> > > >      λ meson setup build2
> > > >      λ ninja -C build2
> > > > 
> > > > works fine, but
> > > > 
> > > >      λ ls -l build2/config*
> > > >      -rw-r--r-- 1 benknoble benknoble 17169  9 févr. 16:39
> > > > build2/ config-list.h
> > > > 
> > > > I don't see the dependency file.
> 
> I've just had a play with this and I don't see the dependency file either -
> I wonder if ninja deletes it after it has read it.

Yeah, that's expected. Meson will prune the depfile after consuming it.

> If I delete Documentation/config/add.adoc then config-list.h is rebuilt.
> However if I edit generate-configlist.sh it is not rebuilt - I guess we need
> to add the script to the dependency file.

True. This is typically handled automatically by Meson, but in our case
it doesn't know that the string we pass to the shell refers to a script,
and that it should thus cause a rebuild if it changes.

Patrick

Re: [PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Phillip Wood]

On 11/02/2026 10:58, Patrick Steinhardt wrote:
> On Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 09:44:48AM +0000, Phillip Wood wrote:
>> On 11/02/2026 07:42, Patrick Steinhardt wrote:
>>> On Mon, Feb 09, 2026 at 04:50:06PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
>>>>> On Sat, Feb 07, 2026 at 04:59:17PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
>>> [snip]
>>>> Only, things are behaving oddly. For example:
>>>>
>>>>       λ meson setup build2
>>>>       λ ninja -C build2
>>>>
>>>> works fine, but
>>>>
>>>>       λ ls -l build2/config*
>>>>       -rw-r--r-- 1 benknoble benknoble 17169  9 févr. 16:39 build2/config-list.h
>>>>
>>>> I don't see the dependency file.
>>>
>>>> Further, re-building seems to get stuck (I get
>>>> similar symptoms if I add or remove a relevant config.adoc file, but let's keep
>>>> it simple for now):
>>>>
>>>>       λ ninja -C build2
>>>>       ninja: Entering directory `build2'
>>>>       [1/28] Generating GIT-VERSION-FILE with a custom command (wrapped by meson to set env)
>>>
>>> With "stuck" you mean that it doesn't do anything, or that it doesn't
>>> actually rebuild?
>>>
>>> I guess it kind of makes sense that a new file wouldn't trigger a
>>> rebuild, even though I would have expected a removed one to trigger one.
>>> After all, the dependency file only tracks the set of _existing_ files
>>> so that we know when to rebuild, and of course the dependency file only
>>> gets regenerated in case any of those files changes.
>>
>> If anyone adds a new file under Documentation/config/ they will need to
>> update Documentation/config.adoc which should then trigger the rebuild. That
>> rebuld will then add the new file to the list of dependencies. If they
>> remove a file we should pick that up with the dependencies that are already
>> listed.
> 
> Oh? Well, if that's the case then the additional changes should indeed
> not be required.

I think so. The only problem I can think of is that if you delete a 
file, build, restore the file without changing anything else and build 
again then config-list.h will not be rebuilt because the deleted file 
would have been removed from the list of dependencies by the previous build.

>>
>> It would be really nice if we can avoid regenerating the depfile with every
>> build.
> 
> Agreed. So maybe the first patch I sent is sufficient after all?

We need to add the script to the list of dependencies and reading the 
comments in 
https://github.com/ninja-build/ninja/blob/master/src/depfile_parser.in.cc 
we should be backslash escaping space, hash and backslash in the 
filename when we write the dependencies. Apart from that I think it is ok.

I guess the alternative is to bite the bullet and list these 
dependencies explicitly as we do for other targets.

Thanks

Phillip

Re: [PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

I'm not totally sure where the discussion ended up (what's actionable
isn't clear to me), but let me respond to at least this bit:

On Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 2:43 AM Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im> wrote:
>
> On Mon, Feb 09, 2026 at 04:50:06PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> > > On Sat, Feb 07, 2026 at 04:59:17PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> [snip]
> > Only, things are behaving oddly. For example:
> >
> >     λ meson setup build2
> >     λ ninja -C build2
> >
> > works fine, but
> >
> >     λ ls -l build2/config*
> >     -rw-r--r-- 1 benknoble benknoble 17169  9 févr. 16:39 build2/config-list.h
> >
> > I don't see the dependency file.
>
> > Further, re-building seems to get stuck (I get
> > similar symptoms if I add or remove a relevant config.adoc file, but let's keep
> > it simple for now):
> >
> >     λ ninja -C build2
> >     ninja: Entering directory `build2'
> >     [1/28] Generating GIT-VERSION-FILE with a custom command (wrapped by meson to set env)
>
> With "stuck" you mean that it doesn't do anything, or that it doesn't
> actually rebuild?

I mean, that's all the output I get, and the build seems unable to
make progress without the depfile present. Maybe I'm misreading the
above output, so let me try again with a different kind of change that
would cause recompilation:

    meson setup build2 && ninja -C build2
    touch git.c
    ninja -C build2

Indeed, this time it definitely works ([6/6] Linking…), so I'm
_probably_ misinterpreting the output.

> I guess it kind of makes sense that a new file wouldn't trigger a
> rebuild, even though I would have expected a removed one to trigger one.
> After all, the dependency file only tracks the set of _existing_ files
> so that we know when to rebuild, and of course the dependency file only
> gets regenerated in case any of those files changes.

Trying this bit again, yeah, config-list.h doesn't get rebuilt if I do
`touch Documentation/fooconfig.adoc` (I think make would rebuild
though). And I can't tell if that's due to the weird [1/28] output or
due to something else, since I can't "see" if Meson recomputed the
depfile or not; with the depfile gone, it seems like there's nothing
present to tell Meson (ninja) when to rebuild, which is weird to me.
It seems this is expected, but it makes it difficult for me to tell
what's going on here.

After `touch Documentation/config.adoc`, ninja executes 7 steps,
including rebuilding the config-list.h, at which point it also knows
to rebuild after touching "fooconfig.adoc" again. So maybe that's
expected?

FWIW, I ran into this because the staleness in the proposed commit
caused some trouble while bisecting a (spurious-due-to-staleness) test
failure, too. Hopefully with the fix in place I won't need to compile
twice during a bisect, ha

Re: [PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

On Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 9:05 AM Phillip Wood <phillip.wood123@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 11/02/2026 10:58, Patrick Steinhardt wrote:
> > On Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 09:44:48AM +0000, Phillip Wood wrote:
> >> On 11/02/2026 07:42, Patrick Steinhardt wrote:
> >>> On Mon, Feb 09, 2026 at 04:50:06PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> >>>>> On Sat, Feb 07, 2026 at 04:59:17PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> >>> [snip]
> >>>> Only, things are behaving oddly. For example:
> >>>>
> >>>>       λ meson setup build2
> >>>>       λ ninja -C build2
> >>>>
> >>>> works fine, but
> >>>>
> >>>>       λ ls -l build2/config*
> >>>>       -rw-r--r-- 1 benknoble benknoble 17169  9 févr. 16:39 build2/config-list.h
> >>>>
> >>>> I don't see the dependency file.
> >>>
> >>>> Further, re-building seems to get stuck (I get
> >>>> similar symptoms if I add or remove a relevant config.adoc file, but let's keep
> >>>> it simple for now):
> >>>>
> >>>>       λ ninja -C build2
> >>>>       ninja: Entering directory `build2'
> >>>>       [1/28] Generating GIT-VERSION-FILE with a custom command (wrapped by meson to set env)
> >>>
> >>> With "stuck" you mean that it doesn't do anything, or that it doesn't
> >>> actually rebuild?
> >>>
> >>> I guess it kind of makes sense that a new file wouldn't trigger a
> >>> rebuild, even though I would have expected a removed one to trigger one.
> >>> After all, the dependency file only tracks the set of _existing_ files
> >>> so that we know when to rebuild, and of course the dependency file only
> >>> gets regenerated in case any of those files changes.
> >>
> >> If anyone adds a new file under Documentation/config/ they will need to
> >> update Documentation/config.adoc which should then trigger the rebuild. That
> >> rebuld will then add the new file to the list of dependencies. If they
> >> remove a file we should pick that up with the dependencies that are already
> >> listed.
> >
> > Oh? Well, if that's the case then the additional changes should indeed
> > not be required.
>
> I think so. The only problem I can think of is that if you delete a
> file, build, restore the file without changing anything else and build
> again then config-list.h will not be rebuilt because the deleted file
> would have been removed from the list of dependencies by the previous build.
>
> >>
> >> It would be really nice if we can avoid regenerating the depfile with every
> >> build.
> >
> > Agreed. So maybe the first patch I sent is sufficient after all?
>
> We need to add the script to the list of dependencies and reading the
> comments in
> https://github.com/ninja-build/ninja/blob/master/src/depfile_parser.in.cc
> we should be backslash escaping space, hash and backslash in the
> filename when we write the dependencies. Apart from that I think it is ok.

Re-reading, I now see something actionable:
- use Patrick's original patch
- add the script itself to dependencies
- quote dependencies correctly

Thanks

> I guess the alternative is to bite the bullet and list these
> dependencies explicitly as we do for other targets.
>
> Thanks
>
> Phillip
>

[PATCH v3] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
header is sometimes stale.

For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
from sources fixes the artifact and the test.

Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
for globbing like Make.

Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
---

Notes (benknoble/commits):
    Changes from v2 (<c9ae171eed6bd5b0fa6671b10a5ad0da024f36d0.1770649805.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
    
    • Pick up (and tweak) Patrick's depfile proposal
    • Include the script itself as a dependency
    • Escape output paths (spaces, octothorpes, and backslashes) for Ninja
    
    I'm not 100% sure I've actually done the escaping correctly, though,
    since Ninja's source says that a space preceded by 2N backslashes
    represents 2N backslashes at the end of a filename, and
    
        λ printf '%s\n' 'foo\' | sed 's/[# \\]/\\&/g' | xxd
        00000000: 666f 6f5c 5c0a                           foo\\.
    
    So would they interpret that as the filename 'foo\\' instead of 'foo\' ?
    (Or, no because the 2N slashes aren't followed by a SP, but a NL?)

 generate-configlist.sh | 10 +++++++++-
 meson.build            |  4 +++-
 2 files changed, 12 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
index 75c39ade20..091efd4564 100755
--- a/generate-configlist.sh
+++ b/generate-configlist.sh
@@ -2,10 +2,11 @@
 
 SOURCE_DIR="$1"
 OUTPUT="$2"
+DEPFILE="$3"
 
 if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
 then
-	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
+	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT> [<DEPFILE>]"
 	exit 1
 fi
 
@@ -36,3 +37,10 @@ print_config_list () {
 	echo
 	print_config_list
 } >"$OUTPUT"
+
+if test -n "$DEPFILE"
+then
+	printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$0" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+	    "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
+	    sed 's/[# \\]/\\&/g' >"$DEPFILE"
+fi
diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
index 3a1d12caa4..fb5d7367f5 100644
--- a/meson.build
+++ b/meson.build
@@ -720,11 +720,13 @@ endif
 
 builtin_sources += custom_target(
   output: 'config-list.h',
+  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
   command: [
     shell,
-    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
+    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
     meson.current_source_dir(),
     '@OUTPUT@',
+    '@DEPFILE@',
   ],
   env: script_environment,
 )

base-commit: 19a08e0c02faf1c5b4efd1add85598cf8390ff7e
prerequisite-patch-id: 364ba1899740b93be5957262d3583348d030e8fa
-- 
2.52.0.rc0.1058.g68d811a4ee.dirty

Re: [PATCH v3] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Patrick Steinhardt]

On Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 06:51:02PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> Notes (benknoble/commits):
>     Changes from v2 (<c9ae171eed6bd5b0fa6671b10a5ad0da024f36d0.1770649805.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>     
>     • Pick up (and tweak) Patrick's depfile proposal
>     • Include the script itself as a dependency
>     • Escape output paths (spaces, octothorpes, and backslashes) for Ninja
>     
>     I'm not 100% sure I've actually done the escaping correctly, though,
>     since Ninja's source says that a space preceded by 2N backslashes
>     represents 2N backslashes at the end of a filename, and

I guess you refer to [1], more specifically this quote:

  Rather than implement all of above, we follow what GCC/Clang produces:

      Backslashes escape a space or hash sign.

      When a space is preceded by 2N+1 backslashes, it is represents N
      backslashes followed by space.

      When a space is preceded by 2N backslashes, it represents 2N
      backslashes at the end of a filename.

      A hash sign is escaped by a single backslash. All other
      backslashes remain unchanged.

>         λ printf '%s\n' 'foo\' | sed 's/[# \\]/\\&/g' | xxd
>         00000000: 666f 6f5c 5c0a                           foo\\.
>     
>     So would they interpret that as the filename 'foo\\' instead of 'foo\' ?
>     (Or, no because the 2N slashes aren't followed by a SP, but a NL?)

I think it would be interpreted as "foo\\". I would say that we really
don't need to go too much into detail here. I very much hope that no
sane person would have literal "\ " in their paths. One might wonder
about Windows, where backslashes are common. But filenames cannot start
with a space there, so this is fine.

So I'd say we should only care about quoting ' ' and '#', nothing else.
We can still iterate going forward if we see that we're too naive.

>  generate-configlist.sh | 10 +++++++++-
>  meson.build            |  4 +++-
>  2 files changed, 12 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
> 
> diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
> index 75c39ade20..091efd4564 100755
> --- a/generate-configlist.sh
> +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
> @@ -36,3 +37,10 @@ print_config_list () {
>  	echo
>  	print_config_list
>  } >"$OUTPUT"
> +
> +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
> +then
> +	printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$0" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \

I think it's a tiny bit hacky that we output the script itself as a
dependency here, and that it would be cleaner to do this via
`depend_files` in the target itself.

> +	    "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> +	    sed 's/[# \\]/\\&/g' >"$DEPFILE"
> +fi

From the above rules I would think that we should simply ignore
backslashes here. As the last rule says, "All other backslashes remain
unchanged.".

> diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
> index 3a1d12caa4..fb5d7367f5 100644
> --- a/meson.build
> +++ b/meson.build
> @@ -720,11 +720,13 @@ endif
>  
>  builtin_sources += custom_target(
>    output: 'config-list.h',
> +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
>    command: [
>      shell,
> -    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
> +    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
>      meson.current_source_dir(),
>      '@OUTPUT@',
> +    '@DEPFILE@',

I didn't know about `@DEPFILE@`, nice.

Thanks!

Patrick

[1]: https://github.com/ninja-build/ninja/blob/cc60300ab94dae9bb28fece3c9b7c397235b17de/src/depfile_parser.in.cc#L27

Re: [PATCH] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Patrick Steinhardt]

On Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 02:58:27PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> I'm not totally sure where the discussion ended up (what's actionable
> isn't clear to me), but let me respond to at least this bit:
> 
> On Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 2:43 AM Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im> wrote:
> >
> > On Mon, Feb 09, 2026 at 04:50:06PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> > > > On Sat, Feb 07, 2026 at 04:59:17PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> > [snip]
> > > Only, things are behaving oddly. For example:
> > >
> > >     λ meson setup build2
> > >     λ ninja -C build2
> > >
> > > works fine, but
> > >
> > >     λ ls -l build2/config*
> > >     -rw-r--r-- 1 benknoble benknoble 17169  9 févr. 16:39 build2/config-list.h
> > >
> > > I don't see the dependency file.
> >
> > > Further, re-building seems to get stuck (I get
> > > similar symptoms if I add or remove a relevant config.adoc file, but let's keep
> > > it simple for now):
> > >
> > >     λ ninja -C build2
> > >     ninja: Entering directory `build2'
> > >     [1/28] Generating GIT-VERSION-FILE with a custom command (wrapped by meson to set env)
> >
> > With "stuck" you mean that it doesn't do anything, or that it doesn't
> > actually rebuild?
> 
> I mean, that's all the output I get, and the build seems unable to
> make progress without the depfile present. Maybe I'm misreading the
> above output, so let me try again with a different kind of change that
> would cause recompilation:

I think you're simply getting confused by Ninja's output.

Ninja knows to short-circuit compilation in case regenerating a target
that is used as input for another target will not cause the file to
change. So what the "[1/28]" says is that we're regenerating the
"GIT-VERSION-FILE", and if it would change we would have to recompile a
bunch of other targets. But we see that it didn't change, and as a
consequence we can skip compiling remaining targets.

> > I guess it kind of makes sense that a new file wouldn't trigger a
> > rebuild, even though I would have expected a removed one to trigger one.
> > After all, the dependency file only tracks the set of _existing_ files
> > so that we know when to rebuild, and of course the dependency file only
> > gets regenerated in case any of those files changes.
> 
> Trying this bit again, yeah, config-list.h doesn't get rebuilt if I do
> `touch Documentation/fooconfig.adoc` (I think make would rebuild
> though). And I can't tell if that's due to the weird [1/28] output or
> due to something else, since I can't "see" if Meson recomputed the
> depfile or not; with the depfile gone, it seems like there's nothing
> present to tell Meson (ninja) when to rebuild, which is weird to me.
> It seems this is expected, but it makes it difficult for me to tell
> what's going on here.
> 
> After `touch Documentation/config.adoc`, ninja executes 7 steps,
> including rebuilding the config-list.h, at which point it also knows
> to rebuild after touching "fooconfig.adoc" again. So maybe that's
> expected?

I assume that you simply didn't have a depfile yet initially, and
because the script itself isn't part of the deps Meson didn't know to
reexecute it as it changed to gain support for the depfile.

Not sure though, but from all I can see things work as expected now with
the current patch that you've sent.

Patrick

Re: [PATCH v3] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Phillip Wood]

Hi Ben

On 11/02/2026 23:51, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
> header is sometimes stale.
> 
> For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
> 4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
> 2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
> it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
> from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
> 
> Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
> generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
> of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
> for globbing like Make.

It would be useful to mention that we assume that if a user adds a new 
file under Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the 
existing files to include that new file and that will trigger a rebuild.

> Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
> Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
> ---
> 
> Notes (benknoble/commits):
>      Changes from v2 (<c9ae171eed6bd5b0fa6671b10a5ad0da024f36d0.1770649805.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>      
>      • Pick up (and tweak) Patrick's depfile proposal
>      • Include the script itself as a dependency
>      • Escape output paths (spaces, octothorpes, and backslashes) for Ninja
>      
>      I'm not 100% sure I've actually done the escaping correctly, though,
>      since Ninja's source says that a space preceded by 2N backslashes
>      represents 2N backslashes at the end of a filename, and
>      
>          λ printf '%s\n' 'foo\' | sed 's/[# \\]/\\&/g' | xxd
>          00000000: 666f 6f5c 5c0a                           foo\\.
>      
>      So would they interpret that as the filename 'foo\\' instead of 'foo\' ?
>      (Or, no because the 2N slashes aren't followed by a SP, but a NL?)

Having re-read the ninja source I agree with Patrick that we should not 
be escaping backslashes

> +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
> +then
> +	printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$0" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +	    "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> +	    sed 's/[# \\]/\\&/g' >"$DEPFILE"

This will escape the space after "$OUTPUT:" which is not what we want.

	printf '%s\n' ... | sed "s/[# ]/\\&/g; s|^|$OUTPUT|" >"$DEPFILE"

should work so long as $OUTPUT does not contain any '|' characters.

Thanks

Phillip

> +fi
> diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
> index 3a1d12caa4..fb5d7367f5 100644
> --- a/meson.build
> +++ b/meson.build
> @@ -720,11 +720,13 @@ endif
>   
>   builtin_sources += custom_target(
>     output: 'config-list.h',
> +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
>     command: [
>       shell,
> -    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
> +    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
>       meson.current_source_dir(),
>       '@OUTPUT@',
> +    '@DEPFILE@',
>     ],
>     env: script_environment,
>   )
> 
> base-commit: 19a08e0c02faf1c5b4efd1add85598cf8390ff7e
> prerequisite-patch-id: 364ba1899740b93be5957262d3583348d030e8fa

Re: [PATCH v3] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Phillip Wood]

On 12/02/2026 10:29, Phillip Wood wrote:
> 
>      printf '%s\n' ... | sed "s/[# ]/\\&/g; s|^|$OUTPUT|" >"$DEPFILE"

Sorry that's missing ": " after $OUTPUT

Thanks

Phillip

Re: [PATCH v3] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Ben Knoble]

Apologies, this has a rather obvious bug:

> 
> Le 11 févr. 2026 à 18:51, D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com> a écrit :
> 
> The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
> header is sometimes stale.
> 
> For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
> 4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
> 2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
> it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
> from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
> 
> Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
> generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
> of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
> for globbing like Make.
> 
> Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
> Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
> ---
> 
> Notes (benknoble/commits):
>    Changes from v2 (<c9ae171eed6bd5b0fa6671b10a5ad0da024f36d0.1770649805.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
> 
>    • Pick up (and tweak) Patrick's depfile proposal
>    • Include the script itself as a dependency
>    • Escape output paths (spaces, octothorpes, and backslashes) for Ninja
> 
>    I'm not 100% sure I've actually done the escaping correctly, though,
>    since Ninja's source says that a space preceded by 2N backslashes
>    represents 2N backslashes at the end of a filename, and
> 
>        λ printf '%s\n' 'foo\' | sed 's/[# \\]/\\&/g' | xxd
>        00000000: 666f 6f5c 5c0a                           foo\\.
> 
>    So would they interpret that as the filename 'foo\\' instead of 'foo\' ?
>    (Or, no because the 2N slashes aren't followed by a SP, but a NL?)
> 
> generate-configlist.sh | 10 +++++++++-
> meson.build            |  4 +++-
> 2 files changed, 12 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
> 
> diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
> index 75c39ade20..091efd4564 100755
> --- a/generate-configlist.sh
> +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
> @@ -2,10 +2,11 @@
> 
> SOURCE_DIR="$1"
> OUTPUT="$2"
> +DEPFILE="$3"
> 
> if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
> then
> -    echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
> +    echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT> [<DEPFILE>]"
>    exit 1
> fi
> 
> @@ -36,3 +37,10 @@ print_config_list () {
>    echo
>    print_config_list
> } >"$OUTPUT"
> +
> +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
> +then
> +    printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$0" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +        "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> +        sed 's/[# \\]/\\&/g' >"$DEPFILE"

This also escapes the space after the OUTPUT: prefix. Will try to find a different way. 

[PATCH v4] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
header is sometimes stale.

For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
from sources fixes the artifact and the test.

Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild.

Also mark the generator script as a dependency.

Combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:

    ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
    ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h

The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.

Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
---

Notes (benknoble/commits):
    Changes from v3 (<0a344f1f3ee4a5d95c6f46df030b9936db4354a1.1770853297.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
    
    • Include the script itself as a dependency via depfile
    • Fix output path escaping (spaces, octothorpes; drop backslashes) for
      Ninja (I've used a loop because I couldn't find a portable construct
      that could escape only the remainder of the lines in the way I
      wanted).
    • Mention our assumptions about Documentation updates triggering
      rebuilds
    • Also include some debugging information in the commit message

 generate-configlist.sh | 12 +++++++++++-
 meson.build            |  5 ++++-
 2 files changed, 15 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
index 75c39ade209..63a2e8b6938 100755
--- a/generate-configlist.sh
+++ b/generate-configlist.sh
@@ -2,10 +2,11 @@
 
 SOURCE_DIR="$1"
 OUTPUT="$2"
+DEPFILE="$3"
 
 if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
 then
-	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
+	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT> [<DEPFILE>]"
 	exit 1
 fi
 
@@ -36,3 +37,12 @@ print_config_list ()
 	echo
 	print_config_list
 } >"$OUTPUT"
+
+if test -n "$DEPFILE"
+then
+	for doc in "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
+	do
+		printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$(printf '%s\n' "$doc" | sed 's/[# ]/\\&/g')"
+	done >"$DEPFILE"
+fi
diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
index 3a1d12caa4b..e4b8f1e33d2 100644
--- a/meson.build
+++ b/meson.build
@@ -720,11 +720,14 @@ endif
 
 builtin_sources += custom_target(
   output: 'config-list.h',
+  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
+  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
   command: [
     shell,
-    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
+    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
     meson.current_source_dir(),
     '@OUTPUT@',
+    '@DEPFILE@',
   ],
   env: script_environment,
 )

Diff-intervalle contre v3 :
1:  0a344f1f3ee ! 1:  9cdcc9de04f meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
    @@ Commit message
         Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
         generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
         of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
    -    for globbing like Make.
    +    for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
    +    Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
    +    to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild.
    +
    +    Also mark the generator script as a dependency.
    +
    +    Combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
    +
    +        ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
    +        ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h
    +
    +    The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
    +    file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
    +    the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.
     
         Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
    +    Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
     
     
      ## Notes (benknoble/commits) ##
    -    Changes from v2 (<c9ae171eed6bd5b0fa6671b10a5ad0da024f36d0.1770649805.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
    +    Changes from v3 (<0a344f1f3ee4a5d95c6f46df030b9936db4354a1.1770853297.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
     
    -    • Pick up (and tweak) Patrick's depfile proposal
    -    • Include the script itself as a dependency
    -    • Escape output paths (spaces, octothorpes, and backslashes) for Ninja
    -
    -    I'm not 100% sure I've actually done the escaping correctly, though,
    -    since Ninja's source says that a space preceded by 2N backslashes
    -    represents 2N backslashes at the end of a filename, and
    -
    -        λ printf '%s\n' 'foo\' | sed 's/[# \\]/\\&/g' | xxd
    -        00000000: 666f 6f5c 5c0a                           foo\\.
    -
    -    So would they interpret that as the filename 'foo\\' instead of 'foo\' ?
    -    (Or, no because the 2N slashes aren't followed by a SP, but a NL?)
    +    • Include the script itself as a dependency via depfile
    +    • Fix output path escaping (spaces, octothorpes; drop backslashes) for
    +      Ninja (I've used a loop because I couldn't find a portable construct
    +      that could escape only the remainder of the lines in the way I
    +      wanted).
    +    • Mention our assumptions about Documentation updates triggering
    +      rebuilds
    +    • Also include some debugging information in the commit message
     
      ## generate-configlist.sh ##
     @@
    @@ generate-configlist.sh: print_config_list ()
     +
     +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
     +then
    -+	printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$0" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
    -+	    "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
    -+	    sed 's/[# \\]/\\&/g' >"$DEPFILE"
    ++	for doc in "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
    ++		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
    ++	do
    ++		printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$(printf '%s\n' "$doc" | sed 's/[# ]/\\&/g')"
    ++	done >"$DEPFILE"
     +fi
     
      ## meson.build ##
    @@ meson.build: endif
      builtin_sources += custom_target(
        output: 'config-list.h',
     +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
    ++  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
        command: [
          shell,
     -    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',

base-commit: 19a08e0c02faf1c5b4efd1add85598cf8390ff7e
prerequisite-patch-id: 364ba1899740b93be5957262d3583348d030e8fa
-- 
2.48.1

Re: [PATCH v4] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Ben Knoble]

> Le 16 févr. 2026 à 17:29, D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com> a écrit :
> 
> The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
> header is sometimes stale.
> 
> For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
> 4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
> 2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
> it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
> from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
> 
> Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
> generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
> of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
> for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
> Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
> to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild.
> 
> Also mark the generator script as a dependency.
> 
> Combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
> 
>    ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
>    ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h
> 
> The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
> file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
> the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.
> 
> Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
> Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
> Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
> ---
> 
> Notes (benknoble/commits):
>    Changes from v3 (<0a344f1f3ee4a5d95c6f46df030b9936db4354a1.1770853297.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
> 
>    • Include the script itself as a dependency via depfile
>    • Fix output path escaping (spaces, octothorpes; drop backslashes) for
>      Ninja (I've used a loop because I couldn't find a portable construct
>      that could escape only the remainder of the lines in the way I
>      wanted).
>    • Mention our assumptions about Documentation updates triggering
>      rebuilds
>    • Also include some debugging information in the commit message
> 
> generate-configlist.sh | 12 +++++++++++-
> meson.build            |  5 ++++-
> 2 files changed, 15 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
> 
> diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
> index 75c39ade209..63a2e8b6938 100755
> --- a/generate-configlist.sh
> +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
> @@ -2,10 +2,11 @@
> 
> SOURCE_DIR="$1"
> OUTPUT="$2"
> +DEPFILE="$3"
> 
> if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
> then
> -    echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
> +    echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT> [<DEPFILE>]"
>    exit 1
> fi
> 
> @@ -36,3 +37,12 @@ print_config_list ()
>    echo
>    print_config_list
> } >"$OUTPUT"
> +
> +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
> +then
> +    for doc in "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +        "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
> +    do
> +        printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$(printf '%s\n' "$doc" | sed 's/[# ]/\\&/g')"
> +    done >"$DEPFILE"
> +fi
> diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
> index 3a1d12caa4b..e4b8f1e33d2 100644
> --- a/meson.build
> +++ b/meson.build
> @@ -720,11 +720,14 @@ endif
> 
> builtin_sources += custom_target(
>   output: 'config-list.h',
> +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
> +  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
>   command: [
>     shell,
> -    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
> +    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
>     meson.current_source_dir(),
>     '@OUTPUT@',
> +    '@DEPFILE@',
>   ],
>   env: script_environment,
> )
> 
> Diff-intervalle contre v3 :
> 1:  0a344f1f3ee ! 1:  9cdcc9de04f meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
>    @@ Commit message
>         Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
>         generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
>         of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
>    -    for globbing like Make.
>    +    for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
>    +    Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
>    +    to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild.
>    +
>    +    Also mark the generator script as a dependency.
>    +
>    +    Combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
>    +
>    +        ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
>    +        ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h
>    +
>    +    The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
>    +    file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
>    +    the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.
> 
>         Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
>    +    Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
> 
> 
>      ## Notes (benknoble/commits) ##
>    -    Changes from v2 (<c9ae171eed6bd5b0fa6671b10a5ad0da024f36d0.1770649805.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>    +    Changes from v3 (<0a344f1f3ee4a5d95c6f46df030b9936db4354a1.1770853297.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
> 
>    -    • Pick up (and tweak) Patrick's depfile proposal
>    -    • Include the script itself as a dependency
>    -    • Escape output paths (spaces, octothorpes, and backslashes) for Ninja
>    -
>    -    I'm not 100% sure I've actually done the escaping correctly, though,
>    -    since Ninja's source says that a space preceded by 2N backslashes
>    -    represents 2N backslashes at the end of a filename, and
>    -
>    -        λ printf '%s\n' 'foo\' | sed 's/[# \\]/\\&/g' | xxd
>    -        00000000: 666f 6f5c 5c0a                           foo\\.
>    -
>    -    So would they interpret that as the filename 'foo\\' instead of 'foo\' ?
>    -    (Or, no because the 2N slashes aren't followed by a SP, but a NL?)
>    +    • Include the script itself as a dependency via depfile
>    +    • Fix output path escaping (spaces, octothorpes; drop backslashes) for
>    +      Ninja (I've used a loop because I couldn't find a portable construct
>    +      that could escape only the remainder of the lines in the way I
>    +      wanted).
>    +    • Mention our assumptions about Documentation updates triggering
>    +      rebuilds
>    +    • Also include some debugging information in the commit message
> 
>      ## generate-configlist.sh ##
>     @@
>    @@ generate-configlist.sh: print_config_list ()
>     +
>     +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
>     +then
>    -+    printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$0" "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
>    -+        "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
>    -+        sed 's/[# \\]/\\&/g' >"$DEPFILE"
>    ++    for doc in "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
>    ++        "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
>    ++    do
>    ++        printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$(printf '%s\n' "$doc" | sed 's/[# ]/\\&/g')"
>    ++    done >"$DEPFILE"
>     +fi
> 
>      ## meson.build ##
>    @@ meson.build: endif
>      builtin_sources += custom_target(
>        output: 'config-list.h',
>     +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
>    ++  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
>        command: [
>          shell,
>     -    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
> 
> base-commit: 19a08e0c02faf1c5b4efd1add85598cf8390ff7e
> prerequisite-patch-id: 364ba1899740b93be5957262d3583348d030e8fa
> --
> 2.48.1

Hmm. I’m pretty sure this worked locally but I’m seeing some CI failures on GitHub. Will investigate. 

Re: [PATCH v4] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Patrick Steinhardt]

On Mon, Feb 16, 2026 at 05:28:57PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
> header is sometimes stale.
> 
> For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
> 4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
> 2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
> it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
> from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
> 
> Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
> generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
> of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
> for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
> Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
> to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild.
> 
> Also mark the generator script as a dependency.
> 
> Combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
> 
>     ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
>     ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h
> 
> The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
> file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
> the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.

Good hint, thanks for putting it here.

> diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
> index 75c39ade209..63a2e8b6938 100755
> --- a/generate-configlist.sh
> +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
> @@ -36,3 +37,12 @@ print_config_list ()
>  	echo
>  	print_config_list
>  } >"$OUTPUT"
> +
> +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
> +then
> +	for doc in "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
> +	do
> +		printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$(printf '%s\n' "$doc" | sed 's/[# ]/\\&/g')"

Tiny nit: can't we simplify this to "$(echo "$doc" | sed ...)"?

> diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
> index 3a1d12caa4b..e4b8f1e33d2 100644
> --- a/meson.build
> +++ b/meson.build
> @@ -720,11 +720,14 @@ endif
>  
>  builtin_sources += custom_target(
>    output: 'config-list.h',
> +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
> +  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
>    command: [
>      shell,
> -    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
> +    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
>      meson.current_source_dir(),
>      '@OUTPUT@',
> +    '@DEPFILE@',
>    ],
>    env: script_environment,
>  )

And this looks as expected now, too. I also verified locally that this
correctly rebuilds things when either the script or any of the files
change.

I wonder whether we also want to have a second patch on top to adjust
our Makefile? E.g. something like this:

diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index 47ed9fa7fd..ed82775ec2 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -2688,8 +2688,10 @@ $(BUILT_INS): git$X
 
 config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
 
-config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
-	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
+config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
+	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
+
+-include .depend/config-list.h.d
 
 command-list.h: generate-cmdlist.sh command-list.txt
 

Please feel free to skip this part though.

Thanks!

Patrick

Re: [PATCH v4] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Patrick Steinhardt]

On Mon, Feb 16, 2026 at 07:33:19PM -0500, Ben Knoble wrote:
> Hmm. I’m pretty sure this worked locally but I’m seeing some CI
> failures on GitHub. Will investigate.

Where did you see the failures? The changes look good to me, and things
work as expected on my machine, so I'm wondering what the root cause is.
A test run at [1] in GitLab's CI is also successful (ignore the
MSVC+Meson failures, a fix for these is being reviewed on the mailing
list already).

Patrick

[1]: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/git/-/merge_requests/505

Re: [PATCH v4] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Phillip Wood]

On 16/02/2026 22:28, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
> header is sometimes stale.
> 
> For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
> 4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
> 2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
> it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
> from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
> 
> Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
> generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
> of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
> for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
> Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
> to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild.
> 
> Also mark the generator script as a dependency.
> 
> Combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
> 
>      ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
>      ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h
> 
> The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
> file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
> the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.
> 
> Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
> Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
> Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>

Thanks for the nicely written commit message.

> +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
> +then
> +	for doc in "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
> +	do
> +		printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$(printf '%s\n' "$doc" | sed 's/[# ]/\\&/g')"\\

This forks two processes for every file which is a bit inefficient and 
will be especially slow on windows. If we quote $OUTPUT first we should 
be able to use a single sed process for all the files

	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT"| sed 's|[/\]|\\&|g')"
	printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
	sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"

Thanks

Phillip

Re: [PATCH v4] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

On Tue, Feb 17, 2026 at 2:02 AM Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im> wrote:
>
> On Mon, Feb 16, 2026 at 05:28:57PM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> > The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
> > header is sometimes stale.
> >
> > For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
> > 4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
> > 2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
> > it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
> > from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
> >
> > Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
> > generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
> > of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
> > for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
> > Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
> > to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild.
> >
> > Also mark the generator script as a dependency.
> >
> > Combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
> >
> >     ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
> >     ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h
> >
> > The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
> > file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
> > the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.
>
> Good hint, thanks for putting it here.
>
> > diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
> > index 75c39ade209..63a2e8b6938 100755
> > --- a/generate-configlist.sh
> > +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
> > @@ -36,3 +37,12 @@ print_config_list ()
> >       echo
> >       print_config_list
> >  } >"$OUTPUT"
> > +
> > +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
> > +then
> > +     for doc in "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> > +             "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
> > +     do
> > +             printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$(printf '%s\n' "$doc" | sed 's/[# ]/\\&/g')"
>
> Tiny nit: can't we simplify this to "$(echo "$doc" | sed ...)"?

Given how unportable echo is [1], I'd prefer to keep printf.

[1]: https://github.com/benknoble/echocho, for one. If the doc started
with "-e" for example the results might be unreliable.


> > diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
> > index 3a1d12caa4b..e4b8f1e33d2 100644
> > --- a/meson.build
> > +++ b/meson.build
> > @@ -720,11 +720,14 @@ endif
> >
> >  builtin_sources += custom_target(
> >    output: 'config-list.h',
> > +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
> > +  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
> >    command: [
> >      shell,
> > -    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
> > +    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
> >      meson.current_source_dir(),
> >      '@OUTPUT@',
> > +    '@DEPFILE@',
> >    ],
> >    env: script_environment,
> >  )
>
> And this looks as expected now, too. I also verified locally that this
> correctly rebuilds things when either the script or any of the files
> change.
>
> I wonder whether we also want to have a second patch on top to adjust
> our Makefile? E.g. something like this:
>
> diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
> index 47ed9fa7fd..ed82775ec2 100644
> --- a/Makefile
> +++ b/Makefile
> @@ -2688,8 +2688,10 @@ $(BUILT_INS): git$X
>
>  config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
>
> -config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
> -       $(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
> +config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
> +       $(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
> +
> +-include .depend/config-list.h.d
>
>  command-list.h: generate-cmdlist.sh command-list.txt
>
>
> Please feel free to skip this part though.
>
> Thanks!
>
> Patrick

That seems reasonable. I'll add to the next version.

Re: [PATCH v4] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

On Tue, Feb 17, 2026 at 2:03 AM Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im> wrote:
>
> On Mon, Feb 16, 2026 at 07:33:19PM -0500, Ben Knoble wrote:
> > Hmm. I’m pretty sure this worked locally but I’m seeing some CI
> > failures on GitHub. Will investigate.
>
> Where did you see the failures? The changes look good to me, and things
> work as expected on my machine, so I'm wondering what the root cause is.
> A test run at [1] in GitLab's CI is also successful (ignore the
> MSVC+Meson failures, a fix for these is being reviewed on the mailing
> list already).
>
> Patrick
>
> [1]: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/git/-/merge_requests/505

I must have misread my mobile notifications; I _thought_ [1] was
failing, but it must have been a different branch I accidentally
pushed to GitHub :) CI for this branch succeeded.

[1]: https://github.com/benknoble/git/actions/runs/22081407078

-- 
D. Ben Knoble

Re: [PATCH v4] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

On Tue, Feb 17, 2026 at 4:20 AM Phillip Wood <phillip.wood123@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 16/02/2026 22:28, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> > +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
> > +then
> > +     for doc in "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> > +             "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
> > +     do
> > +             printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$(printf '%s\n' "$doc" | sed 's/[# ]/\\&/g')"\\
>
> This forks two processes for every file which is a bit inefficient and
> will be especially slow on windows.

Yeah. I couldn't find a way I trusted to behave in the presence of
strange characters, though…

> If we quote $OUTPUT first we should
> be able to use a single sed process for all the files
>
>         QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT"| sed 's|[/\]|\\&|g')"
>         printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
>                 "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
>         sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"

…and this version matches a concept I considered. Let me think aloud.

To quote output, we backslash-escape any "/" and "\"; we are going to
use it in the replacement side of sed's substitute command with "/"
delimiters.

My manual says "&" and "\[0-9]" are also special in the replacement
string. We have no backreferences for the latter, but my sed on macOS
complains about bad backreferences in cases like

    echo abc | sed 's/^/foo\1/'

OTOH, escaping backslashes already covers such backreferences. So I
think we'd need something closer to

    sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g'

? If you agree with that reasoning, I'll include this in the next
version. (I'll also try this out a bit first.)

PS in patterns with so many "vertical" characters, I find the commas a
bit easier to read than pipes :)

Re: [PATCH v4] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Phillip Wood]

On 17/02/2026 13:38, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> On Tue, Feb 17, 2026 at 4:20 AM Phillip Wood <phillip.wood123@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 16/02/2026 22:28, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
>>> +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
>>> +then
>>> +     for doc in "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
>>> +             "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
>>> +     do
>>> +             printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$(printf '%s\n' "$doc" | sed 's/[# ]/\\&/g')"\\
>>
>> This forks two processes for every file which is a bit inefficient and
>> will be especially slow on windows.
> 
> Yeah. I couldn't find a way I trusted to behave in the presence of
> strange characters, though…
> 
>> If we quote $OUTPUT first we should
>> be able to use a single sed process for all the files
>>
>>          QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT"| sed 's|[/\]|\\&|g')"
>>          printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
>>                  "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
>>          sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
> 
> …and this version matches a concept I considered. Let me think aloud.
> 
> To quote output, we backslash-escape any "/" and "\"; we are going to
> use it in the replacement side of sed's substitute command with "/"
> delimiters.
> 
> My manual says "&" and "\[0-9]" are also special in the replacement
> string.

Oh, I should have remembered '&' needed escaping as well

  We have no backreferences for the latter, but my sed on macOS
> complains about bad backreferences in cases like
> 
>      echo abc | sed 's/^/foo\1/'
> 
> OTOH, escaping backslashes already covers such backreferences. So I
> think we'd need something closer to
> 
>      sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g'
> 
> ? If you agree with that reasoning, I'll include this in the next
> version. (I'll also try this out a bit first.)

That looks good to me

> PS in patterns with so many "vertical" characters, I find the commas a
> bit easier to read than pipes :)

Yes, that does make it clearer

Thanks

Phillip

Re: [PATCH v4] meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Junio C Hamano]

"D. Ben Knoble" <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com> writes:

>> > +     for doc in "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
>> > +             "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
>> > +     do
>> > +             printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$(printf '%s\n' "$doc" | sed 's/[# ]/\\&/g')"
>>
>> Tiny nit: can't we simplify this to "$(echo "$doc" | sed ...)"?
>
> Given how unportable echo is [1], I'd prefer to keep printf.
>
> [1]: https://github.com/benknoble/echocho, for one. If the doc started
> with "-e" for example the results might be unreliable.

To cause trouble, wouldn't it be necessary for "$doc" to be exactly
"-e", not "started with"?

And when does $SOURCE_DIR begin with "-e" anyway?  It sounds more or
less academic irrelevancy.

Whatn I am more curious about is the "#"s and spaces being the only
bytes that needs quoting.  As SOURCE_DIR pretty much under end-user's
control (otherwise you wouldn't be worried about it starting with -e),
wouldn't we have other problematic bytes we need to worry about?

[PATCH v5] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
header is sometimes stale.

For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
from sources fixes the artifact and the test.

Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild. Also mark the
generator script as a dependency.

While we're at it, teach the Makefile to use the same "the script knows
it's dependencies" logic.

For Meson, combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:

    ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
    ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h

The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.

Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
---

Notes (benknoble/commits):
    Changes from v4 (<9cdcc9de04f0f8fff657f0474b31c063466ed808.1771280837.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
    
    • Include Patrick's suggested Makefile changes. Note there's no quiet
      equivalent for mdkir that isn't for the current target's containing
      directory…
    • Make depfile output efficient again, thanks to Phillip.
    
    I've kept printf instead of echo (from Patrick/Junio) because I think it
    is easier to reason about ("it works" vs. "did I use this in a way that
    might cause problems").
    
    Junio asked about other problematic bytes: the other one I could think
    of (since all the inputs should be paths, anyway) is newlines. I gave
    meson's depfile.py a glance [1], and it looks like they don't handle
    newlines in paths. Other whitespace doesn't appear to be an issue (see
    "elif c in {' ', '\n'}"); I think _most_ characters are just added to
    the filename.
    
    [1]: https://github.com/mesonbuild/meson/blob/master/mesonbuild/depfile.py

 Makefile               |  5 +++--
 generate-configlist.sh | 11 ++++++++++-
 meson.build            |  5 ++++-
 3 files changed, 17 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)

diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index 7f37ad8f58..6f926ffb1f 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -2688,9 +2688,10 @@ $(BUILT_INS): git$X
 	cp $< $@
 
 config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
+	@mkdir -p .depend
+	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
 
-config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
-	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
+-include .depend/config-list.h.d
 
 command-list.h: generate-cmdlist.sh command-list.txt
 
diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
index 75c39ade20..39ac8845ab 100755
--- a/generate-configlist.sh
+++ b/generate-configlist.sh
@@ -2,10 +2,11 @@
 
 SOURCE_DIR="$1"
 OUTPUT="$2"
+DEPFILE="$3"
 
 if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
 then
-	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
+	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT> [<DEPFILE>]"
 	exit 1
 fi
 
@@ -36,3 +37,11 @@ print_config_list () {
 	echo
 	print_config_list
 } >"$OUTPUT"
+
+if test -n "$DEPFILE"
+then
+	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
+	printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
+		sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
+fi
diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
index 762e2d0fc0..74b459b004 100644
--- a/meson.build
+++ b/meson.build
@@ -720,11 +720,14 @@ endif
 
 builtin_sources += custom_target(
   output: 'config-list.h',
+  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
+  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
   command: [
     shell,
-    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
+    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
     meson.current_source_dir(),
     '@OUTPUT@',
+    '@DEPFILE@',
   ],
   env: script_environment,
 )

Diff-intervalle contre v4 :
1:  e2f4e1f9ba < -:  ---------- completion: add stash import, export
2:  9cdcc9de04 ! 1:  611a94cd98 meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
    @@ Metadata
     Author: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
     
      ## Commit message ##
    -    meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
    +    build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
     
         The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
         header is sometimes stale.
    @@ Commit message
         of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
         for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
         Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
    -    to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild.
    +    to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild. Also mark the
    +    generator script as a dependency.
     
    -    Also mark the generator script as a dependency.
    +    While we're at it, teach the Makefile to use the same "the script knows
    +    it's dependencies" logic.
     
    -    Combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
    +    For Meson, combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
     
             ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
             ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h
    @@ Commit message
     
     
      ## Notes (benknoble/commits) ##
    -    Changes from v3 (<0a344f1f3ee4a5d95c6f46df030b9936db4354a1.1770853297.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
    +    Changes from v4 (<9cdcc9de04f0f8fff657f0474b31c063466ed808.1771280837.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
     
    -    • Include the script itself as a dependency via depfile
    -    • Fix output path escaping (spaces, octothorpes; drop backslashes) for
    -      Ninja (I've used a loop because I couldn't find a portable construct
    -      that could escape only the remainder of the lines in the way I
    -      wanted).
    -    • Mention our assumptions about Documentation updates triggering
    -      rebuilds
    -    • Also include some debugging information in the commit message
    +    • Include Patrick's suggested Makefile changes. Note there's no quiet
    +      equivalent for mdkir that isn't for the current target's containing
    +      directory…
    +    • Make depfile output efficient again, thanks to Phillip.
    +
    +    I've kept printf instead of echo (from Patrick/Junio) because I think it
    +    is easier to reason about ("it works" vs. "did I use this in a way that
    +    might cause problems").
    +
    +    Junio asked about other problematic bytes: the other one I could think
    +    of (since all the inputs should be paths, anyway) is newlines. I gave
    +    meson's depfile.py a glance [1], and it looks like they don't handle
    +    newlines in paths. Other whitespace doesn't appear to be an issue (see
    +    "elif c in {' ', '\n'}"); I think _most_ characters are just added to
    +    the filename.
    +
    +    [1]: https://github.com/mesonbuild/meson/blob/master/mesonbuild/depfile.py
    +
    + ## Makefile ##
    +@@ Makefile: $(BUILT_INS): git$X
    + 	cp $< $@
    + 
    + config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
    ++	@mkdir -p .depend
    ++	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
    + 
    +-config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
    +-	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
    ++-include .depend/config-list.h.d
    + 
    + command-list.h: generate-cmdlist.sh command-list.txt
    + 
     
      ## generate-configlist.sh ##
     @@
    @@ generate-configlist.sh: print_config_list () {
     +
     +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
     +then
    -+	for doc in "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
    -+		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
    -+	do
    -+		printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$(printf '%s\n' "$doc" | sed 's/[# ]/\\&/g')"
    -+	done >"$DEPFILE"
    ++	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
    ++	printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
    ++		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
    ++		sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
     +fi
     
      ## meson.build ##

base-commit: f7e9f6c205466443107228e036b20acb7baa8c50
-- 
2.53.0

Re: [PATCH v5] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Phillip Wood]

Hi Ben

I tested the meson changes by setting up source and build directories 
with daft names to test the quoting.

$ git worktree add --detach '/dev/shm/s#r#c dir'
$ cd '/dev/shm/s#r#c dir'
$ meson setup '/dev/shm/b#u&i ld'

If I build git and then remove Documentation/config/add.adoc 
config-list.h is regenerated, it is not regenerated if I do not change 
any of the config documentation files so it looks to be working 
correctly. I've not tested the Makefile changes.

Thanks for working on it

Phillip

On 18/02/2026 14:37, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
> header is sometimes stale.
> 
> For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
> 4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
> 2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
> it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
> from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
> 
> Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
> generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
> of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
> for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
> Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
> to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild. Also mark the
> generator script as a dependency.
> 
> While we're at it, teach the Makefile to use the same "the script knows
> it's dependencies" logic.
> 
> For Meson, combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
> 
>      ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
>      ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h
> 
> The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
> file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
> the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.
> 
> Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
> Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
> Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
> ---
> 
> Notes (benknoble/commits):
>      Changes from v4 (<9cdcc9de04f0f8fff657f0474b31c063466ed808.1771280837.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>      
>      • Include Patrick's suggested Makefile changes. Note there's no quiet
>        equivalent for mdkir that isn't for the current target's containing
>        directory…
>      • Make depfile output efficient again, thanks to Phillip.
>      
>      I've kept printf instead of echo (from Patrick/Junio) because I think it
>      is easier to reason about ("it works" vs. "did I use this in a way that
>      might cause problems").
>      
>      Junio asked about other problematic bytes: the other one I could think
>      of (since all the inputs should be paths, anyway) is newlines. I gave
>      meson's depfile.py a glance [1], and it looks like they don't handle
>      newlines in paths. Other whitespace doesn't appear to be an issue (see
>      "elif c in {' ', '\n'}"); I think _most_ characters are just added to
>      the filename.
>      
>      [1]: https://github.com/mesonbuild/meson/blob/master/mesonbuild/depfile.py
> 
>   Makefile               |  5 +++--
>   generate-configlist.sh | 11 ++++++++++-
>   meson.build            |  5 ++++-
>   3 files changed, 17 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)
> 
> diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
> index 7f37ad8f58..6f926ffb1f 100644
> --- a/Makefile
> +++ b/Makefile
> @@ -2688,9 +2688,10 @@ $(BUILT_INS): git$X
>   	cp $< $@
>   
>   config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
> +	@mkdir -p .depend
> +	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
>   
> -config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
> -	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
> +-include .depend/config-list.h.d
>   
>   command-list.h: generate-cmdlist.sh command-list.txt
>   
> diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
> index 75c39ade20..39ac8845ab 100755
> --- a/generate-configlist.sh
> +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
> @@ -2,10 +2,11 @@
>   
>   SOURCE_DIR="$1"
>   OUTPUT="$2"
> +DEPFILE="$3"
>   
>   if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
>   then
> -	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
> +	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT> [<DEPFILE>]"
>   	exit 1
>   fi
>   
> @@ -36,3 +37,11 @@ print_config_list () {
>   	echo
>   	print_config_list
>   } >"$OUTPUT"
> +
> +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
> +then
> +	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
> +	printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> +		sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
> +fi
> diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
> index 762e2d0fc0..74b459b004 100644
> --- a/meson.build
> +++ b/meson.build
> @@ -720,11 +720,14 @@ endif
>   
>   builtin_sources += custom_target(
>     output: 'config-list.h',
> +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
> +  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
>     command: [
>       shell,
> -    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
> +    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
>       meson.current_source_dir(),
>       '@OUTPUT@',
> +    '@DEPFILE@',
>     ],
>     env: script_environment,
>   )
> 
> Diff-intervalle contre v4 :
> 1:  e2f4e1f9ba < -:  ---------- completion: add stash import, export
> 2:  9cdcc9de04 ! 1:  611a94cd98 meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
>      @@ Metadata
>       Author: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
>       
>        ## Commit message ##
>      -    meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
>      +    build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
>       
>           The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
>           header is sometimes stale.
>      @@ Commit message
>           of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
>           for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
>           Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
>      -    to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild.
>      +    to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild. Also mark the
>      +    generator script as a dependency.
>       
>      -    Also mark the generator script as a dependency.
>      +    While we're at it, teach the Makefile to use the same "the script knows
>      +    it's dependencies" logic.
>       
>      -    Combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
>      +    For Meson, combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
>       
>               ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
>               ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h
>      @@ Commit message
>       
>       
>        ## Notes (benknoble/commits) ##
>      -    Changes from v3 (<0a344f1f3ee4a5d95c6f46df030b9936db4354a1.1770853297.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>      +    Changes from v4 (<9cdcc9de04f0f8fff657f0474b31c063466ed808.1771280837.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>       
>      -    • Include the script itself as a dependency via depfile
>      -    • Fix output path escaping (spaces, octothorpes; drop backslashes) for
>      -      Ninja (I've used a loop because I couldn't find a portable construct
>      -      that could escape only the remainder of the lines in the way I
>      -      wanted).
>      -    • Mention our assumptions about Documentation updates triggering
>      -      rebuilds
>      -    • Also include some debugging information in the commit message
>      +    • Include Patrick's suggested Makefile changes. Note there's no quiet
>      +      equivalent for mdkir that isn't for the current target's containing
>      +      directory…
>      +    • Make depfile output efficient again, thanks to Phillip.
>      +
>      +    I've kept printf instead of echo (from Patrick/Junio) because I think it
>      +    is easier to reason about ("it works" vs. "did I use this in a way that
>      +    might cause problems").
>      +
>      +    Junio asked about other problematic bytes: the other one I could think
>      +    of (since all the inputs should be paths, anyway) is newlines. I gave
>      +    meson's depfile.py a glance [1], and it looks like they don't handle
>      +    newlines in paths. Other whitespace doesn't appear to be an issue (see
>      +    "elif c in {' ', '\n'}"); I think _most_ characters are just added to
>      +    the filename.
>      +
>      +    [1]: https://github.com/mesonbuild/meson/blob/master/mesonbuild/depfile.py
>      +
>      + ## Makefile ##
>      +@@ Makefile: $(BUILT_INS): git$X
>      + 	cp $< $@
>      +
>      + config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
>      ++	@mkdir -p .depend
>      ++	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
>      +
>      +-config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
>      +-	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
>      ++-include .depend/config-list.h.d
>      +
>      + command-list.h: generate-cmdlist.sh command-list.txt
>      +
>       
>        ## generate-configlist.sh ##
>       @@
>      @@ generate-configlist.sh: print_config_list () {
>       +
>       +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
>       +then
>      -+	for doc in "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
>      -+		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
>      -+	do
>      -+		printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$(printf '%s\n' "$doc" | sed 's/[# ]/\\&/g')"
>      -+	done >"$DEPFILE"
>      ++	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
>      ++	printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
>      ++		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
>      ++		sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
>       +fi
>       
>        ## meson.build ##
> 
> base-commit: f7e9f6c205466443107228e036b20acb7baa8c50

Re: [PATCH v5] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

On Thu, Feb 19, 2026 at 5:19 AM Phillip Wood <phillip.wood123@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hi Ben
>
> I tested the meson changes by setting up source and build directories
> with daft names to test the quoting.
>
> $ git worktree add --detach '/dev/shm/s#r#c dir'
> $ cd '/dev/shm/s#r#c dir'
> $ meson setup '/dev/shm/b#u&i ld'
>
> If I build git and then remove Documentation/config/add.adoc
> config-list.h is regenerated, it is not regenerated if I do not change
> any of the config documentation files so it looks to be working
> correctly. I've not tested the Makefile changes.
>
> Thanks for working on it
>
> Phillip

Great, thanks!

Re: [PATCH v5] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Patrick Steinhardt]

On Wed, Feb 18, 2026 at 09:37:59AM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
> index 75c39ade20..39ac8845ab 100755
> --- a/generate-configlist.sh
> +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
> @@ -36,3 +37,11 @@ print_config_list () {
>  	echo
>  	print_config_list
>  } >"$OUTPUT"
> +
> +if test -n "$DEPFILE"

We could arguably drop conditional now that both the Makefile and Meson
pass that argument, but I don't mind it much.

> +then
> +	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
> +	printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> +		sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
> +fi

Okay, so we first quote the target output file once, and then we quote
the sources with a single call to sed(1), too. To not perform quoting
of the target output file twice we don't include it in the printf call,
but instead prepend it to each line.

Looks reasonable to me, and we spawn at most two sed(1) processes. Nice.

> diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
> index 762e2d0fc0..74b459b004 100644
> --- a/meson.build
> +++ b/meson.build
> @@ -720,11 +720,14 @@ endif
>  
>  builtin_sources += custom_target(
>    output: 'config-list.h',
> +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
> +  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
>    command: [
>      shell,
> -    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
> +    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
>      meson.current_source_dir(),
>      '@OUTPUT@',
> +    '@DEPFILE@',
>    ],
>    env: script_environment,
>  )
> 
> Diff-intervalle contre v4 :
> 1:  e2f4e1f9ba < -:  ---------- completion: add stash import, export

The range-diff is a bit broken, but that doesn't really matter much.
Overall this patch looks good to me, thanks!

Patrick

Re: [PATCH v5] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Marc Branchaud]

On 2026-02-18 07:37, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
> header is sometimes stale.
> 
> For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
> 4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
> 2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
> it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
> from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
> 
> Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
> generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list> of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
> for globbing like Make.

That sentence doesn't parse.  Maybe this?

Since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support for globbing like 
Make, teach generate-configlist.sh to generate a dependency list of the 
Documentation files it reads, and have the Meson build incorporate that.

		M.

> We assume that if a user adds a new file under
> Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
> to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild. Also mark the
> generator script as a dependency.
> 
> While we're at it, teach the Makefile to use the same "the script knows
> it's dependencies" logic.
> 
> For Meson, combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
> 
>      ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
>      ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h
> 
> The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
> file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
> the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.
> 
> Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
> Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
> Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
> ---
> 
> Notes (benknoble/commits):
>      Changes from v4 (<9cdcc9de04f0f8fff657f0474b31c063466ed808.1771280837.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>      
>      • Include Patrick's suggested Makefile changes. Note there's no quiet
>        equivalent for mdkir that isn't for the current target's containing
>        directory…
>      • Make depfile output efficient again, thanks to Phillip.
>      
>      I've kept printf instead of echo (from Patrick/Junio) because I think it
>      is easier to reason about ("it works" vs. "did I use this in a way that
>      might cause problems").
>      
>      Junio asked about other problematic bytes: the other one I could think
>      of (since all the inputs should be paths, anyway) is newlines. I gave
>      meson's depfile.py a glance [1], and it looks like they don't handle
>      newlines in paths. Other whitespace doesn't appear to be an issue (see
>      "elif c in {' ', '\n'}"); I think _most_ characters are just added to
>      the filename.
>      
>      [1]: https://github.com/mesonbuild/meson/blob/master/mesonbuild/depfile.py
> 
>   Makefile               |  5 +++--
>   generate-configlist.sh | 11 ++++++++++-
>   meson.build            |  5 ++++-
>   3 files changed, 17 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)
> 
> diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
> index 7f37ad8f58..6f926ffb1f 100644
> --- a/Makefile
> +++ b/Makefile
> @@ -2688,9 +2688,10 @@ $(BUILT_INS): git$X
>   	cp $< $@
>   
>   config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
> +	@mkdir -p .depend
> +	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
>   
> -config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
> -	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
> +-include .depend/config-list.h.d
>   
>   command-list.h: generate-cmdlist.sh command-list.txt
>   
> diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
> index 75c39ade20..39ac8845ab 100755
> --- a/generate-configlist.sh
> +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
> @@ -2,10 +2,11 @@
>   
>   SOURCE_DIR="$1"
>   OUTPUT="$2"
> +DEPFILE="$3"
>   
>   if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
>   then
> -	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
> +	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT> [<DEPFILE>]"
>   	exit 1
>   fi
>   
> @@ -36,3 +37,11 @@ print_config_list () {
>   	echo
>   	print_config_list
>   } >"$OUTPUT"
> +
> +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
> +then
> +	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
> +	printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> +		sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
> +fi
> diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
> index 762e2d0fc0..74b459b004 100644
> --- a/meson.build
> +++ b/meson.build
> @@ -720,11 +720,14 @@ endif
>   
>   builtin_sources += custom_target(
>     output: 'config-list.h',
> +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
> +  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
>     command: [
>       shell,
> -    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
> +    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
>       meson.current_source_dir(),
>       '@OUTPUT@',
> +    '@DEPFILE@',
>     ],
>     env: script_environment,
>   )
> 
> Diff-intervalle contre v4 :
> 1:  e2f4e1f9ba < -:  ---------- completion: add stash import, export
> 2:  9cdcc9de04 ! 1:  611a94cd98 meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
>      @@ Metadata
>       Author: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
>       
>        ## Commit message ##
>      -    meson: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
>      +    build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
>       
>           The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
>           header is sometimes stale.
>      @@ Commit message
>           of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
>           for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
>           Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
>      -    to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild.
>      +    to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild. Also mark the
>      +    generator script as a dependency.
>       
>      -    Also mark the generator script as a dependency.
>      +    While we're at it, teach the Makefile to use the same "the script knows
>      +    it's dependencies" logic.
>       
>      -    Combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
>      +    For Meson, combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
>       
>               ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
>               ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h
>      @@ Commit message
>       
>       
>        ## Notes (benknoble/commits) ##
>      -    Changes from v3 (<0a344f1f3ee4a5d95c6f46df030b9936db4354a1.1770853297.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>      +    Changes from v4 (<9cdcc9de04f0f8fff657f0474b31c063466ed808.1771280837.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>       
>      -    • Include the script itself as a dependency via depfile
>      -    • Fix output path escaping (spaces, octothorpes; drop backslashes) for
>      -      Ninja (I've used a loop because I couldn't find a portable construct
>      -      that could escape only the remainder of the lines in the way I
>      -      wanted).
>      -    • Mention our assumptions about Documentation updates triggering
>      -      rebuilds
>      -    • Also include some debugging information in the commit message
>      +    • Include Patrick's suggested Makefile changes. Note there's no quiet
>      +      equivalent for mdkir that isn't for the current target's containing
>      +      directory…
>      +    • Make depfile output efficient again, thanks to Phillip.
>      +
>      +    I've kept printf instead of echo (from Patrick/Junio) because I think it
>      +    is easier to reason about ("it works" vs. "did I use this in a way that
>      +    might cause problems").
>      +
>      +    Junio asked about other problematic bytes: the other one I could think
>      +    of (since all the inputs should be paths, anyway) is newlines. I gave
>      +    meson's depfile.py a glance [1], and it looks like they don't handle
>      +    newlines in paths. Other whitespace doesn't appear to be an issue (see
>      +    "elif c in {' ', '\n'}"); I think _most_ characters are just added to
>      +    the filename.
>      +
>      +    [1]: https://github.com/mesonbuild/meson/blob/master/mesonbuild/depfile.py
>      +
>      + ## Makefile ##
>      +@@ Makefile: $(BUILT_INS): git$X
>      + 	cp $< $@
>      +
>      + config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
>      ++	@mkdir -p .depend
>      ++	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
>      +
>      +-config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
>      +-	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
>      ++-include .depend/config-list.h.d
>      +
>      + command-list.h: generate-cmdlist.sh command-list.txt
>      +
>       
>        ## generate-configlist.sh ##
>       @@
>      @@ generate-configlist.sh: print_config_list () {
>       +
>       +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
>       +then
>      -+	for doc in "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
>      -+		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc
>      -+	do
>      -+		printf "$OUTPUT: %s\n" "$(printf '%s\n' "$doc" | sed 's/[# ]/\\&/g')"
>      -+	done >"$DEPFILE"
>      ++	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
>      ++	printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
>      ++		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
>      ++		sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
>       +fi
>       
>        ## meson.build ##
> 
> base-commit: f7e9f6c205466443107228e036b20acb7baa8c50

Re: [PATCH v5] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

On Thu, Feb 19, 2026 at 8:57 AM Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im> wrote:
>
> On Wed, Feb 18, 2026 at 09:37:59AM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> > diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
> > index 75c39ade20..39ac8845ab 100755
> > --- a/generate-configlist.sh
> > +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
> > @@ -36,3 +37,11 @@ print_config_list () {
> >       echo
> >       print_config_list
> >  } >"$OUTPUT"
> > +
> > +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
>
> We could arguably drop conditional now that both the Makefile and Meson
> pass that argument, but I don't mind it much.

I'm going to reroll a commit message, so I could drop this. OTOH, I
think we've got a working configuration, and maybe someone runs this
script occasionally to generate the list without wanting the deps.
Idk.

> > +then
> > +     QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
> > +     printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> > +             "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> > +             sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
> > +fi
>
> Okay, so we first quote the target output file once, and then we quote
> the sources with a single call to sed(1), too. To not perform quoting
> of the target output file twice we don't include it in the printf call,
> but instead prepend it to each line.
>
> Looks reasonable to me, and we spawn at most two sed(1) processes. Nice.
>
> > diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
> > index 762e2d0fc0..74b459b004 100644
> > --- a/meson.build
> > +++ b/meson.build
> > @@ -720,11 +720,14 @@ endif
> >
> >  builtin_sources += custom_target(
> >    output: 'config-list.h',
> > +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
> > +  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
> >    command: [
> >      shell,
> > -    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
> > +    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
> >      meson.current_source_dir(),
> >      '@OUTPUT@',
> > +    '@DEPFILE@',
> >    ],
> >    env: script_environment,
> >  )
> >
> > Diff-intervalle contre v4 :
> > 1:  e2f4e1f9ba < -:  ---------- completion: add stash import, export
>
> The range-diff is a bit broken, but that doesn't really matter much.

Gr. I must have tweaked something at the last second and missed this. Bummer.

> Overall this patch looks good to me, thanks!
>
> Patrick

Thanks for the help and reviews!

Re: [PATCH v5] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

On Thu, Feb 19, 2026 at 10:10 AM Marc Branchaud <marcnarc@xiplink.com> wrote:
>
>
> On 2026-02-18 07:37, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> > The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
> > header is sometimes stale.
> >
> > For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
> > 4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
> > 2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
> > it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
> > from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
> >
> > Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
> > generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
> > of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
> > for globbing like Make.
>
> That sentence doesn't parse.  Maybe this?
>
> Since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support for globbing like
> Make, teach generate-configlist.sh to generate a dependency list of the
> Documentation files it reads, and have the Meson build incorporate that.
>
>                 M.

Thanks. That sentence is looking stranger than when I first wrote it. Will fix.

[PATCH v6] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
header is sometimes stale.

For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
from sources fixes the artifact and the test.

Since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support for globbing like
Make, teach generate-configlist.sh to also generate a list of
Documentation files its output depends on, and incorporate that into the
Meson build.

We assume that if a user adds a new file under
Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild. Also mark the
generator script as a dependency.

While we're at it, teach the Makefile to use the same "the script knows
it's dependencies" logic.

For Meson, combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:

    ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
    ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h

The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.

Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
---

Notes (benknoble/commits):
    Changes from v5 (<611a94cd988e3795bc63dba2f1b270aa0d058bd2.1771425395.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
    
    • Reword a confusing sentence in the commit message

 Makefile               |  5 +++--
 generate-configlist.sh | 11 ++++++++++-
 meson.build            |  5 ++++-
 3 files changed, 17 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)

diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index 7f37ad8f58..6f926ffb1f 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -2688,9 +2688,10 @@ $(BUILT_INS): git$X
 	cp $< $@
 
 config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
+	@mkdir -p .depend
+	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
 
-config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
-	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
+-include .depend/config-list.h.d
 
 command-list.h: generate-cmdlist.sh command-list.txt
 
diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
index 75c39ade20..39ac8845ab 100755
--- a/generate-configlist.sh
+++ b/generate-configlist.sh
@@ -2,10 +2,11 @@
 
 SOURCE_DIR="$1"
 OUTPUT="$2"
+DEPFILE="$3"
 
 if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
 then
-	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
+	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT> [<DEPFILE>]"
 	exit 1
 fi
 
@@ -36,3 +37,11 @@ print_config_list () {
 	echo
 	print_config_list
 } >"$OUTPUT"
+
+if test -n "$DEPFILE"
+then
+	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
+	printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
+		sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
+fi
diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
index 762e2d0fc0..74b459b004 100644
--- a/meson.build
+++ b/meson.build
@@ -720,11 +720,14 @@ endif
 
 builtin_sources += custom_target(
   output: 'config-list.h',
+  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
+  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
   command: [
     shell,
-    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
+    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
     meson.current_source_dir(),
     '@OUTPUT@',
+    '@DEPFILE@',
   ],
   env: script_environment,
 )

Diff-intervalle contre v5 :
1:  611a94cd98 ! 1:  5dcd4e9308 build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
    @@ Commit message
         it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
         from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
     
    -    Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
    -    generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
    -    of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
    -    for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
    +    Since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support for globbing like
    +    Make, teach generate-configlist.sh to also generate a list of
    +    Documentation files its output depends on, and incorporate that into the
    +    Meson build.
    +
    +    We assume that if a user adds a new file under
         Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
         to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild. Also mark the
         generator script as a dependency.
    @@ Commit message
     
     
      ## Notes (benknoble/commits) ##
    -    Changes from v4 (<9cdcc9de04f0f8fff657f0474b31c063466ed808.1771280837.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
    +    Changes from v5 (<611a94cd988e3795bc63dba2f1b270aa0d058bd2.1771425395.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
     
    -    • Include Patrick's suggested Makefile changes. Note there's no quiet
    -      equivalent for mdkir that isn't for the current target's containing
    -      directory…
    -    • Make depfile output efficient again, thanks to Phillip.
    -
    -    I've kept printf instead of echo (from Patrick/Junio) because I think it
    -    is easier to reason about ("it works" vs. "did I use this in a way that
    -    might cause problems").
    -
    -    Junio asked about other problematic bytes: the other one I could think
    -    of (since all the inputs should be paths, anyway) is newlines. I gave
    -    meson's depfile.py a glance [1], and it looks like they don't handle
    -    newlines in paths. Other whitespace doesn't appear to be an issue (see
    -    "elif c in {' ', '\n'}"); I think _most_ characters are just added to
    -    the filename.
    -
    -    [1]: https://github.com/mesonbuild/meson/blob/master/mesonbuild/depfile.py
    +    • Reword a confusing sentence in the commit message
     
      ## Makefile ##
     @@ Makefile: $(BUILT_INS): git$X

base-commit: 4a7958ca1415077ce9b1d0a38223ede55da779d9
-- 
2.53.0

Re: [PATCH v6] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Patrick Steinhardt]

On Sat, Feb 21, 2026 at 09:07:17AM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> Notes (benknoble/commits):
>     Changes from v5 (<611a94cd988e3795bc63dba2f1b270aa0d058bd2.1771425395.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>     
>     • Reword a confusing sentence in the commit message

Thanks, this version looks ready to me.

Patrick

Re: [PATCH v6] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[SZEDER Gábor]

On Sat, Feb 21, 2026 at 09:07:17AM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
> header is sometimes stale.
> 
> For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
> 4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
> 2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
> it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
> from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
> 
> Since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support for globbing like
> Make, teach generate-configlist.sh to also generate a list of
> Documentation files its output depends on, and incorporate that into the
> Meson build.
> 
> We assume that if a user adds a new file under
> Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
> to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild. Also mark the
> generator script as a dependency.
> 
> While we're at it, teach the Makefile to use the same "the script knows
> it's dependencies" logic.
> 
> For Meson, combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
> 
>     ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
>     ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h
> 
> The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
> file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
> the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.
> 
> Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
> Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
> Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
> ---
> 
> Notes (benknoble/commits):
>     Changes from v5 (<611a94cd988e3795bc63dba2f1b270aa0d058bd2.1771425395.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>     
>     • Reword a confusing sentence in the commit message
> 
>  Makefile               |  5 +++--
>  generate-configlist.sh | 11 ++++++++++-
>  meson.build            |  5 ++++-
>  3 files changed, 17 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)
> 
> diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
> index 7f37ad8f58..6f926ffb1f 100644
> --- a/Makefile
> +++ b/Makefile
> @@ -2688,9 +2688,10 @@ $(BUILT_INS): git$X
>  	cp $< $@
>  
>  config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
> +	@mkdir -p .depend
> +	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
>  
> -config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
> -	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
> +-include .depend/config-list.h.d

This breaks the build when something disappears from
Documentation/config/:

  $ git checkout origin/seen
  HEAD is now at 57edfa3ce8 Merge branch 'ty/setup-error-tightening' into seen
  $ ls -l Documentation/config/hook.adoc 
  -rw-rw-r-- 1 szeder szeder 3828 Feb 23 07:50 Documentation/config/hook.adoc
  $ git grep hook.adoc
  Documentation/git-hook.adoc:include::config/hook.adoc[]
  Documentation/howto/meson.build:  'rebuild-from-update-hook.adoc',
  Documentation/meson.build:  'git-hook.adoc' : 1,
  $ make V=1 config-list.h
  /bin/sh ./generate-configlist.sh . config-list.h .depend/config-list.h.d
  $ git checkout 0aabf70f60
  Previous HEAD position was 57edfa3ce8 Merge branch 'ty/setup-error-tightening' into seen
  HEAD is now at 0aabf70f60 build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
  $ ls -l Documentation/config/hook.adoc 
  ls: cannot access 'Documentation/config/hook.adoc': No such file or directory
  $ git grep hook.adoc
  Documentation/howto/meson.build:  'rebuild-from-update-hook.adoc',
  Documentation/meson.build:  'git-hook.adoc' : 1,
  $ make V=1 config-list.h
  GIT_VERSION=2.53.0.119.g0aabf70f60
  make: *** No rule to make target 'Documentation/config/hook.adoc', needed by 'config-list.h'.  Stop.
  $ grep hook.adoc .depend/config-list.h.d 
  config-list.h: ./Documentation/config/hook.adoc


>  command-list.h: generate-cmdlist.sh command-list.txt
>  
> diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
> index 75c39ade20..39ac8845ab 100755
> --- a/generate-configlist.sh
> +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
> @@ -2,10 +2,11 @@
>  
>  SOURCE_DIR="$1"
>  OUTPUT="$2"
> +DEPFILE="$3"
>  
>  if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
>  then
> -	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
> +	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT> [<DEPFILE>]"
>  	exit 1
>  fi
>  
> @@ -36,3 +37,11 @@ print_config_list () {
>  	echo
>  	print_config_list
>  } >"$OUTPUT"
> +
> +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
> +then
> +	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
> +	printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> +		sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
> +fi
> diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
> index 762e2d0fc0..74b459b004 100644
> --- a/meson.build
> +++ b/meson.build
> @@ -720,11 +720,14 @@ endif
>  
>  builtin_sources += custom_target(
>    output: 'config-list.h',
> +  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
> +  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
>    command: [
>      shell,
> -    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
> +    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
>      meson.current_source_dir(),
>      '@OUTPUT@',
> +    '@DEPFILE@',
>    ],
>    env: script_environment,
>  )
> 
> Diff-intervalle contre v5 :
> 1:  611a94cd98 ! 1:  5dcd4e9308 build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
>     @@ Commit message
>          it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
>          from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
>      
>     -    Teach the meson build to depend on the Documentation files that
>     -    generate-configlist.sh reads by having it an additional output as a list
>     -    of dependency files, since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support
>     -    for globbing like Make. We assume that if a user adds a new file under
>     +    Since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support for globbing like
>     +    Make, teach generate-configlist.sh to also generate a list of
>     +    Documentation files its output depends on, and incorporate that into the
>     +    Meson build.
>     +
>     +    We assume that if a user adds a new file under
>          Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
>          to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild. Also mark the
>          generator script as a dependency.
>     @@ Commit message
>      
>      
>       ## Notes (benknoble/commits) ##
>     -    Changes from v4 (<9cdcc9de04f0f8fff657f0474b31c063466ed808.1771280837.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>     +    Changes from v5 (<611a94cd988e3795bc63dba2f1b270aa0d058bd2.1771425395.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>      
>     -    • Include Patrick's suggested Makefile changes. Note there's no quiet
>     -      equivalent for mdkir that isn't for the current target's containing
>     -      directory…
>     -    • Make depfile output efficient again, thanks to Phillip.
>     -
>     -    I've kept printf instead of echo (from Patrick/Junio) because I think it
>     -    is easier to reason about ("it works" vs. "did I use this in a way that
>     -    might cause problems").
>     -
>     -    Junio asked about other problematic bytes: the other one I could think
>     -    of (since all the inputs should be paths, anyway) is newlines. I gave
>     -    meson's depfile.py a glance [1], and it looks like they don't handle
>     -    newlines in paths. Other whitespace doesn't appear to be an issue (see
>     -    "elif c in {' ', '\n'}"); I think _most_ characters are just added to
>     -    the filename.
>     -
>     -    [1]: https://github.com/mesonbuild/meson/blob/master/mesonbuild/depfile.py
>     +    • Reword a confusing sentence in the commit message
>      
>       ## Makefile ##
>      @@ Makefile: $(BUILT_INS): git$X
> 
> base-commit: 4a7958ca1415077ce9b1d0a38223ede55da779d9
> -- 
> 2.53.0
> 

Re: [PATCH v6] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Ben Knoble]

> Le 23 févr. 2026 à 01:55, SZEDER Gábor <szeder.dev@gmail.com> a écrit :
> 
> On Sat, Feb 21, 2026 at 09:07:17AM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
>> The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
>> header is sometimes stale.
>> 
>> For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
>> 4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
>> 2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
>> it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
>> from sources fixes the artifact and the test.
>> 
>> Since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support for globbing like
>> Make, teach generate-configlist.sh to also generate a list of
>> Documentation files its output depends on, and incorporate that into the
>> Meson build.
>> 
>> We assume that if a user adds a new file under
>> Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
>> to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild. Also mark the
>> generator script as a dependency.
>> 
>> While we're at it, teach the Makefile to use the same "the script knows
>> it's dependencies" logic.
>> 
>> For Meson, combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:
>> 
>>    ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
>>    ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h
>> 
>> The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
>> file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
>> the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.
>> 
>> Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
>> Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
>> Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
>> ---
>> 
>> Notes (benknoble/commits):
>>    Changes from v5 (<611a94cd988e3795bc63dba2f1b270aa0d058bd2.1771425395.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>> 
>>    • Reword a confusing sentence in the commit message
>> 
>> Makefile               |  5 +++--
>> generate-configlist.sh | 11 ++++++++++-
>> meson.build            |  5 ++++-
>> 3 files changed, 17 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)
>> 
>> diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
>> index 7f37ad8f58..6f926ffb1f 100644
>> --- a/Makefile
>> +++ b/Makefile
>> @@ -2688,9 +2688,10 @@ $(BUILT_INS): git$X
>>    cp $< $@
>> 
>> config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
>> +    @mkdir -p .depend
>> +    $(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
>> 
>> -config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
>> -    $(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
>> +-include .depend/config-list.h.d
> 
> This breaks the build when something disappears from
> Documentation/config/:
> 
>  $ git checkout origin/seen
>  HEAD is now at 57edfa3ce8 Merge branch 'ty/setup-error-tightening' into seen
>  $ ls -l Documentation/config/hook.adoc
>  -rw-rw-r-- 1 szeder szeder 3828 Feb 23 07:50 Documentation/config/hook.adoc
>  $ git grep hook.adoc
>  Documentation/git-hook.adoc:include::config/hook.adoc[]
>  Documentation/howto/meson.build:  'rebuild-from-update-hook.adoc',
>  Documentation/meson.build:  'git-hook.adoc' : 1,
>  $ make V=1 config-list.h
>  /bin/sh ./generate-configlist.sh . config-list.h .depend/config-list.h.d
>  $ git checkout 0aabf70f60
>  Previous HEAD position was 57edfa3ce8 Merge branch 'ty/setup-error-tightening' into seen
>  HEAD is now at 0aabf70f60 build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
>  $ ls -l Documentation/config/hook.adoc
>  ls: cannot access 'Documentation/config/hook.adoc': No such file or directory
>  $ git grep hook.adoc
>  Documentation/howto/meson.build:  'rebuild-from-update-hook.adoc',
>  Documentation/meson.build:  'git-hook.adoc' : 1,
>  $ make V=1 config-list.h
>  GIT_VERSION=2.53.0.119.g0aabf70f60
>  make: *** No rule to make target 'Documentation/config/hook.adoc', needed by 'config-list.h'.  Stop.
>  $ grep hook.adoc .depend/config-list.h.d
>  config-list.h: ./Documentation/config/hook.adoc

Indeed. This might arise while bisecting, which was my original motivation. Thoughts on a path forward? At least this issue (to me) is clearer than a spurious test failure :)

Re: [PATCH v6] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Patrick Steinhardt]

On Mon, Feb 23, 2026 at 04:41:48PM -0500, Ben Knoble wrote:
> > Le 23 févr. 2026 à 01:55, SZEDER Gábor <szeder.dev@gmail.com> a écrit :
> > On Sat, Feb 21, 2026 at 09:07:17AM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> >> diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
> >> index 7f37ad8f58..6f926ffb1f 100644
> >> --- a/Makefile
> >> +++ b/Makefile
> >> @@ -2688,9 +2688,10 @@ $(BUILT_INS): git$X
> >>    cp $< $@
> >> 
> >> config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
> >> +    @mkdir -p .depend
> >> +    $(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
> >> 
> >> -config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
> >> -    $(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
> >> +-include .depend/config-list.h.d
> > 
> > This breaks the build when something disappears from
> > Documentation/config/:
> > 
> >  $ git checkout origin/seen
> >  HEAD is now at 57edfa3ce8 Merge branch 'ty/setup-error-tightening' into seen
> >  $ ls -l Documentation/config/hook.adoc
> >  -rw-rw-r-- 1 szeder szeder 3828 Feb 23 07:50 Documentation/config/hook.adoc
> >  $ git grep hook.adoc
> >  Documentation/git-hook.adoc:include::config/hook.adoc[]
> >  Documentation/howto/meson.build:  'rebuild-from-update-hook.adoc',
> >  Documentation/meson.build:  'git-hook.adoc' : 1,
> >  $ make V=1 config-list.h
> >  /bin/sh ./generate-configlist.sh . config-list.h .depend/config-list.h.d
> >  $ git checkout 0aabf70f60
> >  Previous HEAD position was 57edfa3ce8 Merge branch 'ty/setup-error-tightening' into seen
> >  HEAD is now at 0aabf70f60 build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
> >  $ ls -l Documentation/config/hook.adoc
> >  ls: cannot access 'Documentation/config/hook.adoc': No such file or directory
> >  $ git grep hook.adoc
> >  Documentation/howto/meson.build:  'rebuild-from-update-hook.adoc',
> >  Documentation/meson.build:  'git-hook.adoc' : 1,
> >  $ make V=1 config-list.h
> >  GIT_VERSION=2.53.0.119.g0aabf70f60
> >  make: *** No rule to make target 'Documentation/config/hook.adoc', needed by 'config-list.h'.  Stop.
> >  $ grep hook.adoc .depend/config-list.h.d
> >  config-list.h: ./Documentation/config/hook.adoc
> 
> Indeed. This might arise while bisecting, which was my original
> motivation. Thoughts on a path forward? At least this issue (to me) is
> clearer than a spurious test failure :)

For Meson this case works alright. So maybe we just drop the changes to
the Makefile and call it a day?

An alternative would be to have the following patch on top:

diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
index 39ac8845ab..e28054f9e0 100755
--- a/generate-configlist.sh
+++ b/generate-configlist.sh
@@ -41,7 +41,12 @@ EOF
 if test -n "$DEPFILE"
 then
 	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
-	printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
-		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
-		sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
+	{
+		printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+			"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
+			sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /"
+		printf '%s:\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+			"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
+			sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g'
+	} >"$DEPFILE"
 fi

What it does is to also create an empty target for all of the
dependencies. Which is in fact what GCC/Clang also do when you pass -MP:

    $ cat main.c
    #include "foo.h"
    int main()
    {
        puts("foobar");
        return 0;
    }

    $ clang -MMD -MP main.c
    $ cat main.d
    main.o: main.c foo.h
    foo.h:

Patrick

Re: [PATCH v6] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Phillip Wood]

On 24/02/2026 09:58, Patrick Steinhardt wrote:
> On Mon, Feb 23, 2026 at 04:41:48PM -0500, Ben Knoble wrote:
>>> Le 23 févr. 2026 à 01:55, SZEDER Gábor <szeder.dev@gmail.com> a écrit :
>>> On Sat, Feb 21, 2026 at 09:07:17AM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
>>>> diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
>>>> index 7f37ad8f58..6f926ffb1f 100644
>>>> --- a/Makefile
>>>> +++ b/Makefile
>>>> @@ -2688,9 +2688,10 @@ $(BUILT_INS): git$X
>>>>     cp $< $@
>>>>
>>>> config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
>>>> +    @mkdir -p .depend
>>>> +    $(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
>>>>
>>>> -config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
>>>> -    $(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
>>>> +-include .depend/config-list.h.d
>>>
>>> This breaks the build when something disappears from
>>> Documentation/config/:
>>>
>>>   $ git checkout origin/seen
>>>   HEAD is now at 57edfa3ce8 Merge branch 'ty/setup-error-tightening' into seen
>>>   $ ls -l Documentation/config/hook.adoc
>>>   -rw-rw-r-- 1 szeder szeder 3828 Feb 23 07:50 Documentation/config/hook.adoc
>>>   $ git grep hook.adoc
>>>   Documentation/git-hook.adoc:include::config/hook.adoc[]
>>>   Documentation/howto/meson.build:  'rebuild-from-update-hook.adoc',
>>>   Documentation/meson.build:  'git-hook.adoc' : 1,
>>>   $ make V=1 config-list.h
>>>   /bin/sh ./generate-configlist.sh . config-list.h .depend/config-list.h.d
>>>   $ git checkout 0aabf70f60
>>>   Previous HEAD position was 57edfa3ce8 Merge branch 'ty/setup-error-tightening' into seen
>>>   HEAD is now at 0aabf70f60 build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
>>>   $ ls -l Documentation/config/hook.adoc
>>>   ls: cannot access 'Documentation/config/hook.adoc': No such file or directory
>>>   $ git grep hook.adoc
>>>   Documentation/howto/meson.build:  'rebuild-from-update-hook.adoc',
>>>   Documentation/meson.build:  'git-hook.adoc' : 1,
>>>   $ make V=1 config-list.h
>>>   GIT_VERSION=2.53.0.119.g0aabf70f60
>>>   make: *** No rule to make target 'Documentation/config/hook.adoc', needed by 'config-list.h'.  Stop.
>>>   $ grep hook.adoc .depend/config-list.h.d
>>>   config-list.h: ./Documentation/config/hook.adoc
>>
>> Indeed. This might arise while bisecting, which was my original
>> motivation. Thoughts on a path forward? At least this issue (to me) is
>> clearer than a spurious test failure :)
> 
> For Meson this case works alright. So maybe we just drop the changes to
> the Makefile and call it a day?
> 
> An alternative would be to have the following patch on top:
> 
> diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
> index 39ac8845ab..e28054f9e0 100755
> --- a/generate-configlist.sh
> +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
> @@ -41,7 +41,12 @@ EOF
>   if test -n "$DEPFILE"
>   then
>   	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
> -	printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> -		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> -		sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
> +	{
> +		printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +			"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> +			sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /"
> +		printf '%s:\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> +			"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> +			sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g'
> +	} >"$DEPFILE"
>   fi
> 
> What it does is to also create an empty target for all of the
> dependencies. Which is in fact what GCC/Clang also do when you pass -MP:

Oh, I was wondering how they got around the problem we're seeing here. 
While it seems ninja is happy it ignore missing dependencies in 
depfiles, are we sure the build systems meson uses on other platforms 
are as well? If not it might be worth adding this, rather than just 
dropping the Makefile changes.

Thanks

Phillip

> 
>      $ cat main.c
>      #include "foo.h"
>      int main()
>      {
>          puts("foobar");
>          return 0;
>      }
> 
>      $ clang -MMD -MP main.c
>      $ cat main.d
>      main.o: main.c foo.h
>      foo.h:
> 
> Patrick

Re: [PATCH v6] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

On Tue, Feb 24, 2026 at 6:00 AM Phillip Wood <phillip.wood123@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> On 24/02/2026 09:58, Patrick Steinhardt wrote:
> > On Mon, Feb 23, 2026 at 04:41:48PM -0500, Ben Knoble wrote:
> >>> Le 23 févr. 2026 à 01:55, SZEDER Gábor <szeder.dev@gmail.com> a écrit :
> >>> On Sat, Feb 21, 2026 at 09:07:17AM -0500, D. Ben Knoble wrote:
> >>>> diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
> >>>> index 7f37ad8f58..6f926ffb1f 100644
> >>>> --- a/Makefile
> >>>> +++ b/Makefile
> >>>> @@ -2688,9 +2688,10 @@ $(BUILT_INS): git$X
> >>>>     cp $< $@
> >>>>
> >>>> config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
> >>>> +    @mkdir -p .depend
> >>>> +    $(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
> >>>>
> >>>> -config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
> >>>> -    $(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
> >>>> +-include .depend/config-list.h.d
> >>>
> >>> This breaks the build when something disappears from
> >>> Documentation/config/:
> >>>
> >>>   $ git checkout origin/seen
> >>>   HEAD is now at 57edfa3ce8 Merge branch 'ty/setup-error-tightening' into seen
> >>>   $ ls -l Documentation/config/hook.adoc
> >>>   -rw-rw-r-- 1 szeder szeder 3828 Feb 23 07:50 Documentation/config/hook.adoc
> >>>   $ git grep hook.adoc
> >>>   Documentation/git-hook.adoc:include::config/hook.adoc[]
> >>>   Documentation/howto/meson.build:  'rebuild-from-update-hook.adoc',
> >>>   Documentation/meson.build:  'git-hook.adoc' : 1,
> >>>   $ make V=1 config-list.h
> >>>   /bin/sh ./generate-configlist.sh . config-list.h .depend/config-list.h.d
> >>>   $ git checkout 0aabf70f60
> >>>   Previous HEAD position was 57edfa3ce8 Merge branch 'ty/setup-error-tightening' into seen
> >>>   HEAD is now at 0aabf70f60 build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
> >>>   $ ls -l Documentation/config/hook.adoc
> >>>   ls: cannot access 'Documentation/config/hook.adoc': No such file or directory
> >>>   $ git grep hook.adoc
> >>>   Documentation/howto/meson.build:  'rebuild-from-update-hook.adoc',
> >>>   Documentation/meson.build:  'git-hook.adoc' : 1,
> >>>   $ make V=1 config-list.h
> >>>   GIT_VERSION=2.53.0.119.g0aabf70f60
> >>>   make: *** No rule to make target 'Documentation/config/hook.adoc', needed by 'config-list.h'.  Stop.
> >>>   $ grep hook.adoc .depend/config-list.h.d
> >>>   config-list.h: ./Documentation/config/hook.adoc
> >>
> >> Indeed. This might arise while bisecting, which was my original
> >> motivation. Thoughts on a path forward? At least this issue (to me) is
> >> clearer than a spurious test failure :)
> >
> > For Meson this case works alright. So maybe we just drop the changes to
> > the Makefile and call it a day?
> >
> > An alternative would be to have the following patch on top:
> >
> > diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
> > index 39ac8845ab..e28054f9e0 100755
> > --- a/generate-configlist.sh
> > +++ b/generate-configlist.sh
> > @@ -41,7 +41,12 @@ EOF
> >   if test -n "$DEPFILE"
> >   then
> >       QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
> > -     printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> > -             "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> > -             sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
> > +     {
> > +             printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> > +                     "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> > +                     sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /"
> > +             printf '%s:\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
> > +                     "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
> > +                     sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g'
> > +     } >"$DEPFILE"
> >   fi
> >
> > What it does is to also create an empty target for all of the
> > dependencies. Which is in fact what GCC/Clang also do when you pass -MP:
>
> Oh, I was wondering how they got around the problem we're seeing here.
> While it seems ninja is happy it ignore missing dependencies in
> depfiles, are we sure the build systems meson uses on other platforms
> are as well? If not it might be worth adding this, rather than just
> dropping the Makefile changes.
>
> Thanks
>
> Phillip
>
> >
> >      $ cat main.c
> >      #include "foo.h"
> >      int main()
> >      {
> >          puts("foobar");
> >          return 0;
> >      }
> >
> >      $ clang -MMD -MP main.c
> >      $ cat main.d
> >      main.o: main.c foo.h
> >      foo.h:
> >
> > Patrick

Yep, I agree with Phillip: I have a feeling Meson intends folks to
produce output like GCC/Clang do, so let's honor that (even if it's
not well-documented IMO). Will add.

-- 
D. Ben Knoble

[PATCH v7] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[D. Ben Knoble]

The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
header is sometimes stale.

For example, an old build directory might have config-list.h from before
4173df5187 (submodule: introduce extensions.submodulePathConfig,
2026-01-12), which added submodule.<name>.gitdir to the list. Without
it, t9902-completion.sh fails. Regenerating the config-list.h artifact
from sources fixes the artifact and the test.

Since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support for globbing like
Make, teach generate-configlist.sh to also generate a list of
Documentation files its output depends on, and incorporate that into the
Meson build. We honor the undocumented GCC/Clang contract of outputting
empty targets for all the dependencies (like they do with -MP). That is,
generate lines like

    build/config-list.h: $SOURCE_DIR/Documentation/config.adoc
    $SOURCE_DIR/Documentation/config.adoc:

We assume that if a user adds a new file under
Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
to include that new file, and that will trigger a rebuild. Also mark the
generator script as a dependency.

While we're at it, teach the Makefile to use the same "the script knows
it's dependencies" logic.

For Meson, combining the following commands helps debug dependencies:

    ninja -C <builddir> -t deps config-list.h
    ninja -C <builddir> -t browse config-list.h

The former lists all the dependencies discovered from our output ".d"
file (the config documentation) and the latter shows the dependency on
the script itself, among other useful edges in the dependency graph.

Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
---

Notes (benknoble/commits):
    Changes from v6 (<5dcd4e9308100a25603c50fecb36447c0ee4df62.1771682788.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
    
    • Fix Make-based builds when a dependency is removed by generating the
      expected empty targets. (Thanks to a report from Szeder Gábor.)

 Makefile               |  5 +++--
 generate-configlist.sh | 16 +++++++++++++++-
 meson.build            |  5 ++++-
 3 files changed, 22 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)

diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index 7f37ad8f58..6f926ffb1f 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -2688,9 +2688,10 @@ $(BUILT_INS): git$X
 	cp $< $@
 
 config-list.h: generate-configlist.sh
+	@mkdir -p .depend
+	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@ .depend/config-list.h.d
 
-config-list.h: Documentation/*config.adoc Documentation/config/*.adoc
-	$(QUIET_GEN)$(SHELL_PATH) ./generate-configlist.sh . $@
+-include .depend/config-list.h.d
 
 command-list.h: generate-cmdlist.sh command-list.txt
 
diff --git a/generate-configlist.sh b/generate-configlist.sh
index 75c39ade20..e28054f9e0 100755
--- a/generate-configlist.sh
+++ b/generate-configlist.sh
@@ -2,10 +2,11 @@
 
 SOURCE_DIR="$1"
 OUTPUT="$2"
+DEPFILE="$3"
 
 if test -z "$SOURCE_DIR" || ! test -d "$SOURCE_DIR" || test -z "$OUTPUT"
 then
-	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT>"
+	echo >&2 "USAGE: $0 <SOURCE_DIR> <OUTPUT> [<DEPFILE>]"
 	exit 1
 fi
 
@@ -36,3 +37,16 @@ print_config_list () {
 	echo
 	print_config_list
 } >"$OUTPUT"
+
+if test -n "$DEPFILE"
+then
+	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
+	{
+		printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+			"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
+			sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /"
+		printf '%s:\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
+			"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
+			sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g'
+	} >"$DEPFILE"
+fi
diff --git a/meson.build b/meson.build
index 6f155beafa..4b536e0124 100644
--- a/meson.build
+++ b/meson.build
@@ -722,11 +722,14 @@ endif
 
 builtin_sources += custom_target(
   output: 'config-list.h',
+  depfile: 'config-list.h.d',
+  depend_files: [ 'generate-configlist.sh' ],
   command: [
     shell,
-    meson.current_source_dir() + '/generate-configlist.sh',
+    meson.current_source_dir() / 'generate-configlist.sh',
     meson.current_source_dir(),
     '@OUTPUT@',
+    '@DEPFILE@',
   ],
   env: script_environment,
 )

Diff-intervalle contre v6 :
1:  7ffbde5f8a ! 1:  4ef96c6bbf build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes
    @@ Commit message
         Since Meson does not have (or want) builtin support for globbing like
         Make, teach generate-configlist.sh to also generate a list of
         Documentation files its output depends on, and incorporate that into the
    -    Meson build.
    +    Meson build. We honor the undocumented GCC/Clang contract of outputting
    +    empty targets for all the dependencies (like they do with -MP). That is,
    +    generate lines like
    +
    +        build/config-list.h: $SOURCE_DIR/Documentation/config.adoc
    +        $SOURCE_DIR/Documentation/config.adoc:
     
         We assume that if a user adds a new file under
         Documentation/config then they will also edit one of the existing files
    @@ Commit message
     
     
      ## Notes (benknoble/commits) ##
    -    Changes from v5 (<611a94cd988e3795bc63dba2f1b270aa0d058bd2.1771425395.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
    +    Changes from v6 (<5dcd4e9308100a25603c50fecb36447c0ee4df62.1771682788.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
     
    -    • Reword a confusing sentence in the commit message
    +    • Fix Make-based builds when a dependency is removed by generating the
    +      expected empty targets. (Thanks to a report from Szeder Gábor.)
     
      ## Makefile ##
     @@ Makefile: $(BUILT_INS): git$X
    @@ generate-configlist.sh: print_config_list () {
     +if test -n "$DEPFILE"
     +then
     +	QUOTED_OUTPUT="$(printf '%s\n' "$OUTPUT" | sed 's,[&/\],\\&,g')"
    -+	printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
    -+		"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
    -+		sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /" >"$DEPFILE"
    ++	{
    ++		printf '%s\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
    ++			"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
    ++			sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g' -e "s/^/$QUOTED_OUTPUT: /"
    ++		printf '%s:\n' "$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/*config.adoc \
    ++			"$SOURCE_DIR"/Documentation/config/*.adoc |
    ++			sed -e 's/[# ]/\\&/g'
    ++	} >"$DEPFILE"
     +fi
     
      ## meson.build ##

base-commit: 309c995771be952610fdcff99f7fea96934ce045
-- 
2.53.0.537.g7ffbde5f8a.dirty

Re: [PATCH v7] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Junio C Hamano]

"D. Ben Knoble" <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com> writes:

> The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
> header is sometimes stale.
> ...
> Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
> Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
> Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
> ---
>
> Notes (benknoble/commits):
>     Changes from v6 (<5dcd4e9308100a25603c50fecb36447c0ee4df62.1771682788.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>     
>     • Fix Make-based builds when a dependency is removed by generating the
>       expected empty targets. (Thanks to a report from Szeder Gábor.)

OK, now we are pretty much completed and ready to merge it down to
'next'?  Let me mark it as such.

Thanks.

Re: [PATCH v7] build: regenerate config-list.h when Documentation changes

[Ben Knoble]

> Le 25 févr. 2026 à 13:45, Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com> a écrit :
> 
> "D. Ben Knoble" <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com> writes:
> 
>> The Meson-based build doesn't know when to rebuild config-list.h, so the
>> header is sometimes stale.
>> ...
>> Helped-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
>> Helped-by: Phillip Wood <phillip.wood@dunelm.org.uk>
>> Signed-off-by: D. Ben Knoble <ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>
>> ---
>> 
>> Notes (benknoble/commits):
>>    Changes from v6 (<5dcd4e9308100a25603c50fecb36447c0ee4df62.1771682788.git.ben.knoble+github@gmail.com>):
>> 
>>    • Fix Make-based builds when a dependency is removed by generating the
>>      expected empty targets. (Thanks to a report from Szeder Gábor.)
> 
> OK, now we are pretty much completed and ready to merge it down to
> 'next'?  Let me mark it as such.
> 
> Thanks.

I certainly hope so. Thanks.

Family are in town and new kittens come home Saturday, so replies may come slowly. But of course I will be responsive to lingering issues uncovered.