From 359354cde8c35fdd9a475182986b7a634498ea3c Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Cody Boone Ferguson <53008573+xexyl@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Tue, 12 Dec 2023 05:09:50 -0800
Subject: [PATCH] Simplify how to redefine macros in 2014/birken

Now one can do

    make clobber PORT=31337 TIME=50000 alt

or whatever.
---
 2014/birken/Makefile  | 8 ++++++++
 2014/birken/README.md | 6 +++---
 thanks-for-help.md    | 3 ++-
 3 files changed, 13 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)

diff --git a/2014/birken/Makefile b/2014/birken/Makefile
index 35e4a8375..13e5b7768 100644
--- a/2014/birken/Makefile
+++ b/2014/birken/Makefile
@@ -139,6 +139,14 @@ ${PROG}: ${PROG}.c
 alt: data ${ALT_TARGET}
 	@${TRUE}
 
+# Variables to control port and timing constant in alt code
+#
+PORT= 1701
+TIME= 500000
+
+${PROG}.alt: ${PROG}.alt.c
+	${CC} ${CFLAGS} -DNCC=${PORT} -DSTARDATE=${TIME} $< -o $@ ${LDFLAGS}
+
 # data files
 #
 data: ${DATA}
diff --git a/2014/birken/README.md b/2014/birken/README.md
index c168af240..92073487a 100644
--- a/2014/birken/README.md
+++ b/2014/birken/README.md
@@ -56,13 +56,13 @@ described by the author. See [configuration](#configuration) below.
 To specify the port to say, 31337, try:
 
 ```sh
-make clobber CDEFINE="-DNCC=31337" alt
+make clobber PORT=31337 alt
 ```
 
-To change the `STARDATE` timing constant, try:
+To change the timing constant, `STARDATE`, try:
 
 ```sh
-make clobber CDEFINE="-DSTARDATE=5000000" alt
+make clobber TIME=5000000 alt
 ```
 
 You can combine them both of course.
diff --git a/thanks-for-help.md b/thanks-for-help.md
index 0c4ffcacd..b0b464957 100644
--- a/thanks-for-help.md
+++ b/thanks-for-help.md
@@ -3677,7 +3677,8 @@ code](/2014/birken/README.md#alternate-code) that lets one redefine the port to
 bind to in case there is a firewall issue or there is some other reason to not
 have the default port. Remember that ports < 1024 are privileged. It also lets
 you redefine the timing constant `STARDATE` (see the author's remarks for more
-details).
+details on this macro). The Makefile was made to use variables so it's easier to
+redefine the port and timing constant.
 
 
 ## <a name="2014_deak"></a>[2014/deak](/2014/deak/prog.c) ([README.md](/2014/deak/README.md))