make "foo.a(j.o)" bug

[Bruce Hill]

I'm using make 3.79.1 on a Sparc running Solaris 7, and
have found that the GNU make archive member syntax is
always finding that the object file is newer than the archive
member even after updating the archive.
Ex.

foo.a(j.o):   j.o
    ar  rv   foo.a   j.o

This bug also occurs without a makefile with implicit rules
generating the same ar command for a command line of
% make "foo.a(j.o)"

We also had the same problem with make 3.79, and have
the same results with Sun's ar, Gnu ar, and Greenhills ax.

Is anyone else using this syntax successfully?

If so, which version of Gnu make are you using?

Thanks!
- Bruce Hill
address@hidden