makefile Getting started with makefile generic rule to gzip a file

Example

if a directory contain 2 files:

$ ls
makefile
example.txt

and makefile contain the following text

%.gz: %
    gzip $<

then you can obtain example.txt.gz by typing in the shell

$ make -f makefile example.txt.gz

the makefile consist of only one rule that instruct make how to create a file whose name end with .gz if there is a file with the same name but the .gz suffix.