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NMAKE options are described in the following table. Options are preceded by either a slash (/) or a dash (–) and are not case sensitive. Use !CMDSWITCHES to change option settings in a makefile or in Tools.ini.
| Option | Action |
| /A | Forces build of all evaluated targets, even if not out-of-date with respect to dependents. Does not force build of unrelated targets. |
| /B | Forces build even if timestamps are equal. Recommended only for very fast systems (resolution of two seconds or less). |
| /C | Suppresses default output, including nonfatal NMAKE errors or warnings, timestamps, and NMAKE copyright message. Suppresses warnings issued by /K. |
| /D | Displays timestamps of each evaluated target and dependent and a message when a target does not exist. Useful with /P for debugging a makefile. Use !CMDSWITCHES to set or clear /D for part of a makefile. |
| /E | Causes environment variables to override makefile macro definitions. |
| /F filename | Specifies filename as a makefile. Spaces or tabs can precede filename. Specify /F once for each makefile. To supply a makefile from standard input, specify a dash (–) for filename, and end keyboard input with either F6 or CTRL+Z. |
| /HELP, /? | Displays a brief summary of NMAKE command-line syntax. |
| /I | Ignores exit codes from all commands. To set or clear /I for part of a makefile, use !CMDSWITCHES. To ignore exit codes for part of a makefile, use a dash (–) command modifier or .IGNORE. Overrides /K if both are specified. |
| /K | Continues building unrelated dependencies, if a command returns an error. Also issues a warning and returns an exit code of 1. By default, NMAKE halts if any command returns a nonzero exit code. Warnings from /K are suppressed by /C; /I overrides /K if both are specified. |
| /N | Displays but does not execute commands; preprocessing commands are executed. Does not display commands in recursive NMAKE calls. Useful for debugging makefiles and checking timestamps. To set or clear /N for part of a makefile, use !CMDSWITCHES. |
| /NOLOGO | Suppresses the NMAKE copyright message. |
| /P | Displays information (macro definitions, inference rules, targets, .SUFFIXES list) to standard output, and then runs the build. If no makefile or command-line target exists, it displays information only. Use with /D to debug a makefile. |
| /Q | Checks timestamps of targets; does not run the build. Returns a zero exit code if all targets are up-to-date and a nonzero exit code if any target is not. Preprocessing commands are executed. Useful when running NMAKE from a batch file. |
| /R | Clears the .SUFFIXES list and ignores inference rules and macros that are defined in the Tools.ini file or that are predefined. |
| /S | Suppresses display of executed commands. To suppress display in part of a makefile, use the @ command modifier or .SILENT. To set or clear /S for part of a makefile, use !CMDSWITCHES. |
| /T | Updates timestamps of command-line targets (or first makefile target) and executes preprocessing commands but does not run the build. |
| /U | Must be used in conjunction with /N. Dumps inline NMAKE files so that the /N output can be used as a batch file. |
| /X filename | Sends NMAKE error output to filename instead of standard error. Spaces or tabs can precede filename. To send error output to standard output, specify a dash (–) for filename. Does not affect output from commands to standard error. |
| /Y | Disables batch-mode inference rules. When this option is selected, all batch-mode inference rules are treated as regular inference rules. |