diff --git a/CHANGES b/CHANGES
index 1cecbe3..3e3f930 100644
--- a/CHANGES
+++ b/CHANGES
@@ -35,6 +35,11 @@ Building:
 	variable SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH.
 	Thanks to Viktor Kleinik for sending a patch.
 
+	Building Socat in a sub directory failed.
+	Now the following works even for the docu parts:
+	mkdir -p myos; cd myos; ../configure && make; cd ..
+	Thanks to Jon Ringle for sending a patch.
+
 Testing:
 	test.sh: many corrections for AIX's older shell utilities, e.g.sleep(1)
 	does not allow fractions of seconds, grep does not understand '\<';
diff --git a/Makefile.in b/Makefile.in
index 5c7c66b..af96e23 100644
--- a/Makefile.in
+++ b/Makefile.in
@@ -100,10 +100,11 @@ docclean:
 	rm -f doc/socat.1 doc/socat.html
 
 doc/socat.1: doc/socat.yo
-	yodl2man -o $@ $+
+	mkdir -p $(@D); yodl2man -o $@ $+
 
 doc/socat.html: doc/socat.yo
-	cd doc; yodl2html -o socat.html socat.yo; cd ..
+# care for refs in html
+	mkdir -p $(@D); cd $(@D); yodl2html -o socat.html ../$+; cd ..
 
 progs: $(PROGS)