But I'd like to understand what's happening here in a little more depth. Why is it that "program-eyebeam: eyebeam.hex" works, but "program-cylon:cylon.hex" fails?
You have to make sure your cylon.hex is in that list. The program-cylon: is looking for that .hex file to program the AVR with, but until it's built, it won't find it.
But this does not solve the bug. I'm receiving the same error message as before: "No rule to make target `cylon.hex', needed by `program-cylon'. Stop."
The \ on the end of each line means there is more than one line. I couldn't tell if you had left it off the end after make.hex, or it the BBS software wrapped that line.
Ok, I should have tested it before I said anything.
I just tried the makefile only adding in the program-cylon: cylon.hex line. The makefile compiled it no problem. I suggest you upgrade your WinAVR to the latest version http://sourceforge.net/projects/winavr/files/WinAVR/ as I had to.
You issue it not avrdude (the flash burning software) it's avr-gcc and the compiling process.
You will probably have to edit the directories that the makefile is using. Here's mine:
OK I've figured out ways around this by using Makefiles from other projects ... so I'm still not sure what was wrong, but it's not important anymore. Thanks for the help!