project('link_depends_custom_target', 'c') cmd = find_program('make_file.py') dep_file = custom_target('gen_dep', command: [cmd, '@OUTPUT@'], output: 'dep_file') exe = executable('foo', 'foo.c', link_depends: dep_file, c_args: ['-DDEPFILE="' + dep_file.full_path()+ '"']) # check that dep_file exists, which means that link_depends target ran test('runtest', exe)