diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0f05c93
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -0,0 +1,22 @@
+# Builds specifications
+
+.PHONY: default clean
+
+default: lvspec.pdf
+
+%.pdf: %.tex verstr.tex
+	pdflatex $* \
+		&& makeindex $(patsubst %.tex, %.idx, $<) \
+		&& pdflatex $< \
+		&& pdflatex $< \
+		|| rm $@
+
+# outputs a version string to uniquely identify the document revision
+# TODO: use tag name if matches current commit
+verstr.tex:
+	git log -n1 --format=%h | tr -d '\n' > verstr.tex
+	test -z "$$( git status -s | grep -v '^?? ' )" \
+		|| echo -n '-dirty' >> verstr.tex
+
+clean:
+	rm -f *.pdf
diff --git a/common.bib b/common.bib
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..14e476f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/common.bib
@@ -0,0 +1,8 @@
+% Misc.
+@misc{ brooks-law,
+  title="Brooks's law",
+  howpublished="Wikipedia",
+  month="Aug",
+  year="2013",
+  url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooks's_law"
+}