The Makefile

Qi uses a Makefile to manage most development workflows, usable by both developers as well as tools. For instance, the Makefile target test can be used to run tests both locally (e.g. using make test) and in CI jobs. This ensures that any bugs that could arise out of differently executed commands locally vs remotely are avoided.

Conversely, for any commands that may need to be run by tools, an effort has been made to write a Makefile target for it, so that, once again, it could be run in the same way by developers if that became necessary.

This ensures that both humans and tools interact with Qi's development workflows through a common (and convenient) interface -- the Makefile. Said another way, the Makefile serves as a kind of collection of development-related macros that could be run by anyone.

You can familiarize yourself with the Makefile facilities by running make help or simply make.