Re: 'make install' builds stuff as root

[Bill Allombert <Bill.Allombert@math.u-bordeaux.fr>]

On Fri, Jan 01, 2021 at 01:01:49AM -0500, Jeffrey Walton wrote:
> Hi Everyone,
> 
> I don't believe this is supposed to happen. 'make install' is not
> supposed to build anything. The user is responsible for creating
> artifacts before 'make install' is run. 'make install' is also running
> as root. We don't want programs doing things as root.
> 
> $ ./Configure ...
> ...
> $ make gp
> ...
> $ make test-all
> ...
> $ sudo make install

If you want to avoid that, do "make all" before "make install"
like I suggested.

In any case, 'sudo make install' is never quite a safe thing to do.
If one want to be really cautious, one should do
make install DESTDIR=$PWD/rootdir
and then move the file from $PWD/rootdir to / as root using
a safe update process.

Your suggestion would lead to dozen of reports of people complaining
that "make install" fails, even when run without sudo.

Cheers,
Bill