OCAMLBUILD(1) General Commands Manual OCAMLBUILD(1)

ocamlbuild - The OCaml project compilation tool

ocamlbuild [ -Is  dir1,... ] [ -libs lib1,... ] [ -lflags flag1,... ] [ -pp flags ] [ -tags tag1,... ] [ -j  parallel-jobs ] target.native [ -- arg1 arg2 ... ]

(same options)

ocamlbuild(1) orchestrates the compilation process of your OCaml project. It is similar in function to make(1) except that it is tailor-made to automatically compile most OCaml projects with very little user input.

ocamlbuild should be invoked in the root of a clean project tree (e.g., with no leftover compilation files). Given one or more targets to compile, it scans the required subdirectories to gather information about the various files present, running tools such as ocamldep(1) to extract dependency information, and gathering optional files that fine-tune its behaviour. Target names are very significant.

ocamlbuild uses a set of target naming conventions to select the kind of objects to produce. Target names are of the form base.extension where base is usually the name of the underlying OCaml module and extension denotes the kind of object to produce from that file -- a byte code executable, a native executable, documentation... Of course extensions such as .cmo, .cma, .cmi... map to their usual counterparts. Here is a list of the most important ocamlbuild-specific extensions:

.native
Native code executable
.byte
Byte code executable
.inferred.mli
Interface inferred with ocamlc-i
.docdir/index.html
HTML documentation generated with ocamldoc

The following command-line options are recognized by ocamlbuild(1).

Display the version
same as -version
Display the version number
same as -vnum
Make as quiet as possible
Set the verbosity level on a scale from 0 to 8 (included)
Show rules and flags
Set log file
No log file
Remove build directory and other files, then exit
Traverse directories by default (true: traverse)
Add to include directories
(same as above, but accepts a (comma or blank)-separated list)
Directory to ignore
(idem)
Link to this ocaml library
(idem)
Link to this ocaml module
(idem)
Link to this ocaml findlib package
(idem)
(idem)
Specify syntax using ocamlfind
Add to ocamlc link flags
(idem)
Add to ocamlc compile flags
(idem)
Add to ocamldoc flags
(idem)
Add to ocamlyacc flags
(idem)
Add to ocamllex flags
(idem)
Add to ocaml preprocessing flags
(idem)
Add to default tags
(idem)
Use this tag when compiling the myocamlbuild.ml plugin
(idem)
Use this line of tags (as in _tags)
Show tags that applies on that pathname
Don't try to build these modules
Don't make links of produced final targets
Don't skip modules that are requested by ocamldep but cannot be built
Don't apply sanity-check rules
Don't build myocamlbuild.ml
Don't ignore stdlib modules
Don't catch and display exceptions (useful to display the call stack)
Just build myocamlbuild.ml
Don't use a native plugin but bytecode
Use the option only when plugin is run
Change the file name for the generated sanitization script
Do not generate sanitization script
Fail if something needs to be rebuilt
Display executed commands the old-fashioned way
Use menhir instead of ocamlyacc
Use jocaml compilers instead of ocaml ones
Use the 'ocamlfind' wrapper instead of using Findlib directly to determine command-line arguments. Use -no-ocamlfind to disable. Implies -plugin-use-ocamlfind.
Don't use ocamlfind. Implies -plugin-no-ocamlfind.
Use the 'ocamlfind' wrapper for building myocamlbuild.ml
Don't use ocamlfind for building myocamlbuild.ml
Set the Findlib toolchain to use. The default toolchain is always used for building myocamlbuild.ml.
Allow N jobs at once (0 for unlimited)
Set build directory (implies no-links)
Set the install library directory
Set the install binary directory
Display the install library directory
Display path to the tool command
Set the OCaml bytecode compiler
Set the OCaml bytecode compiler used when building myocamlbuild.ml (only)
Set the OCaml native compiler
Set the OCaml native compiler used when building myocamlbuild.ml (only)
Set the OCaml dependency tool
Set the OCaml documentation generator
Set the ocamlyacc tool
Set the menhir tool (use it after -use-menhir)
Set the ocamllex tool
Set the ocamlmklib tool
Set the ocamlmktop tool
Set the ocamlrun tool
--
Stop argument processing, remaining arguments are given to the user program
Display this list of options
Display this list of options

The ocamlbuild manual, ocaml(1), make(1).
The OCaml user's manual, chapter Batch compilation .