You can settle on make (or just) and have consistent targets like run, test, build, deploy, etc….

I use emacs, so I have compilation buffers for those.

Oh I forgot about "just"! (and I have Opinions about that name.) Add that to the list. Making order from chaos is not unfamiliar to me. Previously I standardized on make and was fastidious about making makefiles, but with atuin, command directory history the extra effort to create makefiles became superfluous.

I used to have this fantasy that after I die, someone will care enough to go through my ~/projects folder and go through everything I worked on, and all those makefiles and readmes were going to help them, but no one cares that much for me. I'm okay with that, depressing as it is.