making a directory only if it does not exist

[Terrence M. Brannon]

my $(WARES) rule below is failing with an error instead of being skipped when the $(WARES) directory exists:

.PHONY: cpan
include main.makepp
all: $(WARES) $(EDAN_EL) cpan
$(WARES): $(WARES)
    mkdir $(WARES)
$(EDAN_EL): edan.el
    cp $(input) $(output)
cpan:
    ${SUDO} cpan File::Butler

[Terrence M. Brannon]

I figured it out. I was using $(WARES) and both target and dependency. Just remove it as a dependency.