title: Is there a way to tell my makefile to output a custom error message if a certain an include file is not found?
body: <p>I have a <code>configure</code> script that generates a <code>config.inc</code> file containing some variable definitions and a <code>makefile</code> that imports those configurations using</p>
  
  
  
  <pre><code>include config.inc
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>The thing that bothers me is that if the user tries to run the makefile directly without first running configure they get an unhelpful error message:</p>
  
  <pre class="lang-none prettyprint-override"><code>makefile:2: config.inc: No such file or directory
  make: *** No rule to make target 'config.inc'.  Stop.
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Is there a way for me to produce a better error message, instructing the user to first run the configure script, without resorting to the autoconf strategy of generating the full makefile from inside <code>configure</code>?</p>