-# The escaping is absurd, but we need to escape for shell, sed, make, define
-GIT_VERSION:="$(shell git describe --tags --always) ($(shell git log --pretty=format:%cd --date=short -n1), branch $(shell [ -f $(TOPDIR)/.git/HEAD ] && sed 's/ref: refs\/heads\/\(.*\)/\\\\\\"\1\\\\\\"/g' $(TOPDIR)/.git/HEAD || echo 'unknown'))"
-VERSION:=$(shell git describe --tags --abbrev=0)
+
+# In dist tarballs, the version is stored in the I3_VERSION and VERSION files.
+I3_VERSION := '$(shell [ -f $(TOPDIR)/I3_VERSION ] && cat $(TOPDIR)/I3_VERSION)'
+VERSION := '$(shell [ -f $(TOPDIR)/VERSION ] && cat $(TOPDIR)/VERSION)'
+ifeq ('',$(I3_VERSION))
+VERSION := $(shell git describe --tags --abbrev=0)
+I3_VERSION := '$(shell git describe --tags --always) ($(shell git log --pretty=format:%cd --date=short -n1), branch \"$(shell git describe --tags --always --all | sed s:heads/::)\")'
+endif
+
+MAJOR_VERSION := $(shell echo ${VERSION} | cut -d '.' -f 1)
+MINOR_VERSION := $(shell echo ${VERSION} | cut -d '.' -f 2)
+PATCH_VERSION := $(shell echo ${VERSION} | cut -d '.' -f 3)
+ifeq (${PATCH_VERSION},)
+PATCH_VERSION := 0
+endif
+
+## Generic flags
+
+# Default CFLAGS that users should be able to override
+ifeq ($(DEBUG),1)
+# Extended debugging flags, macros shall be available in gcc
+CFLAGS ?= -pipe -gdwarf-2 -g3
+else
+CFLAGS ?= -pipe -O2 -freorder-blocks-and-partition
+endif
+
+# Default LDFLAGS that users should be able to override
+LDFLAGS ?= $(as_needed_LDFLAG)
+
+# Common CFLAGS for all i3 related binaries
+I3_CFLAGS = -std=c99
+I3_CFLAGS += -Wall
+# unused-function, unused-label, unused-variable are turned on by -Wall
+# We don’t want unused-parameter because of the use of many callbacks
+I3_CFLAGS += -Wunused-value
+I3_CFLAGS += -Iinclude
+
+I3_CPPFLAGS = -DI3_VERSION=\"${I3_VERSION}\"
+I3_CPPFLAGS += -DMAJOR_VERSION=${MAJOR_VERSION}
+I3_CPPFLAGS += -DMINOR_VERSION=${MINOR_VERSION}
+I3_CPPFLAGS += -DPATCH_VERSION=${PATCH_VERSION}
+I3_CPPFLAGS += -DSYSCONFDIR=\"${SYSCONFDIR}\"
+I3_CPPFLAGS += -DI3__FILE__=__FILE__
+
+
+## Libraries flags