=============
Introduction
=============

**mkg is still at early stage. We may introduce compatibility-breaking changes**
**without any warning.**

``mkg`` stands for Makefile Generator, a opinionated GNU Make-based project generator.
The utility aims to simplify the routines to write boilerplate code for cross-platform
Makefile and to create common project structures. Currently, ``mkg`` supports console 
application and library projects for either C or C++.

``mkg`` is hosted on the following sites:

* Main: `mkg on GitHub <https://github.com/cwchentw/mkg>`_
* Mirror: `mkg on GitLab <https://gitlab.com/cwchen/mkg>`_

We re-invent a wheel that is

* **Green**: ``mkg`` is a statically-compiled executable that relies on no external runtime
* **Portable**: ``mkg`` itself and generated projects are portable across major desktop platforms
* **Simple**: no yet another Makefile generating language but the dead simple Makefile

There have been several software projects with similar objective of ``mkg``.
`Autotools <https://www.gnu.org/savannah-checkouts/gnu/autoconf/manual/autoconf-2.69/html_node/The-GNU-Build-System.html#The-GNU-Build-System>`_
is a well-known Makefile-generating tool but only feasible on Unix-like systems.
`CMake <https://cmake.org/>`_ is famous and cross-platform, but CMake users needs another full
language to utilize this tool. `Bakefile <https://bakefile.org/>`_ is a less famous alternative to
CMake, sharing similar pros and cons of CMake. There are some community Makefile generators like
`PyMake <https://github.com/Melinysh/PyMake>`_ and `vfnmake <https://github.com/Vifon/vfnmake>`_ but
they rely on some external runtimes and provide no support for Windows-family systems. Therefore,
we made our own wheel.

``mkg`` *doesn't intend to compete with Autotools or CMake but works as a simple tool.*

In the future, we may add the following features:

* Fortran projects based on gFortran
* Objective-C projects based on GNUStep
* Vala projects
* LaTeX projects
* CMake-based projects besides GNU Make-based ones

``mkg`` is licensed under `the MIT License <https://opensource.org/licenses/MIT>`_. Nevertheless, the project generated by ``mkg`` is not restricted by any license, able to use for any purpose, either commercial or non-commercial. We set a license chooser in ``mkg`` just for convenience. ``mkg`` users may use their own licenses when proper.