Building external modules is typically done using this command:

  $ make -C <KERNEL_DIR> M=<EXTMOD_DIR>

Here, <KERNEL_DIR> refers to the output directory where the kernel was
built, not the kernel source directory.

When the kernel is built in the source tree, there is no ambiguity, as
the output directory and the source directory are the same.

If the kernel was built in a separate build directory, <KERNEL_DIR>
should be the kernel output directory. Otherwise, Kbuild cannot locate
necessary build artifacts. This has been the method for building
external modules against a pre-built kernel in a separate directory
for over 20 years. [1]

If you pass the kernel source directory to the -C option, you must also
specify the kernel build directory using the O= option. This approach
works as well, though it results in a slightly longer command:

  $ make -C <KERNEL_SOURCE_DIR> O=<KERNEL_BUILD_DIR> M=<EXTMOD_DIR>

Some people mistakenly believe that O= should specify a build directory
for external modules when used together with M=. This commit adds more
clarification to Documentation/kbuild/kbuild.rst.

[1]: https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/history/history.git/commit/?id=e321b2ec2eb2993b3d0116e5163c78ad923e3c54Signed-off-by: Masahiro Yamada <masahiroy@kernel.org>
Reviewed-by: Nicolas Schier <n.schier@avm.de>