diff --git a/first/get_makepars b/first/get_makepars
index 24cdf85a3..36da886cd 100755
--- a/first/get_makepars
+++ b/first/get_makepars
@@ -26,7 +26,7 @@ EOF
 		: We can find out ourselves what the word-size and
 		: the pointer-size of the target machine is.
 		cc ws.c 2>/dev/null
-		a.out > t$$
+		./a.out > t$$
 		. t$$
 		rm -f t$$ a.out ws.[co]
 	else