Hi, to let the 'find' in stupid_clean remove even file names with spaces you may replace it with: find . -name '*.o' -o -name '*.so' -o -name '*.py[co]' -o -name 'core*' | while read file do rm -f "$file" done It's not clear to me why you put that command in a separate file, but the clean target of the main Makefile could easily look like: BUILDED_FILE=-name '*.o' -o -name '*.so' -o -name '*.py[co]' -o -name 'core*' clean: find . $(BUILDED_FILE) | \ while read file ;\ do rm -f "$file" ;\ done rm -rf lib/python/build I added last call to rm since no Makefile removes lib/python/build. ciao, -- Luca - De Whiskey's - De Vitis | Elegant or ugly code as well aliases: Luca ^De [A-Z][-A-Za-z]*[iy]'?s$ | as fine or rude sentences have Infinite loop: see `Loop, infinite'. | something in common: they Loop, infinite: see `Infinite loop'. | don't depend on the language.