Using Makefile to clean subdirectories

Question

Is it possible to perform a make clean from the parent directory which also recursively cleans all sub-directories without having to include a makefile in each sub-directory?

Answer 1

A variation of @Christoph answer:

# Exclude directory from find . command
# https://stackoverflow.com/questions/4210042/exclude-directory-from-find-command
GARBAGE_TYPES         := "*.gz(busy)" *.aux *.log *.pdf *.aux *.bbl *.log *.out *.synctex.gz *.fls
DIRECTORIES_TO_CLEAN  := $(shell find -not -path "./.git**" -not -path "./images**" -type d)
GARBAGE_TYPED_FOLDERS := $(foreach DIR, $(DIRECTORIES_TO_CLEAN), $(addprefix $(DIR)/,$(GARBAGE_TYPES)))

clean:
    $(RM) -rf $(GARBAGE_TYPED_FOLDERS)
    # echo $(GARBAGE_TYPED_FOLDERS)

This is an example for latex files. The first pattern on GARBAGE_TYPES has the double quotes around it because of the parenthesis on the file type name. Without it, rm cannot remove them. The other patterns does not need the quotes.

The second DIRECTORIES_TO_CLEAN uses the opposite of a list of directories to clean, i.e., a list of directories to not clean. This is useful when you have only one or two directories as .git and images which you do not want to clean, but want to clean everything else.