Re: [Beanshell-dev] Build file for BeanShel

This is a good question.  I defiantly feel that ant is insufficient.

Problems with Ant
1. It is way to verbose.
2. You cannot build C++ projects with Ant.  I know there are people who 
have tried and I've seen the plugins. To build a C++ project you need to 
iterate through a list of files performing an operation on each one.  I 
have yet to see Ant to such a thing.  Yes I could write a plugin to do 
this and I could also alter the trunk of my car to haul dirt, but what I 
really need is a truck.
3. Ant builds are based on tasks and not file dependencies.  Using file 
dependencies is much more powerful.  If the project is up to date and 
you try to build it, it should do nothing.
4. Flexibility.  In order to get ant to do anything out of the ordinary 
I have to write a new task plugin.  Then I have to make sure that 
whoever is building my project has that plugin.
5. Lack of procedural constructs.  I would like to put some common 
functionality in a method somewhere and call it from various places in 
the build file.  Ant can't do that.  But wait you can use BeanShell in 
ant using the BSF.  I say drop the Ant and keep the scripting language.

Yes my build file is structurally similar to the ant build file, but I 
believe it to be functionally superior.  Here is an example.  Touch one 
of the script files in the src/bsh/commands directory and then run the 
distribute target with CPMake. and this is the output:
Copied 1 files to classes/bsh/commands
Creating dist/bsh-2.0b2.jar
Creating docs\manual\bshcommands-bshdoc.xml
Creating dist/bsh-2.0b2-src.jar
Build time: 00:00:09

It built only what needed to be built.
Now touch the file again and run "ant dist".  It pretty much recreates 
the whole world.

Now for another test.  Rerun the cpmake command without touching the 
file and you get this:
Build time: 00:00:04

It knew that nothing needed to be done.  Ant pretty much does what it 
did before.

And its not like my error messages aren't long enough without ant 
prepending on the task tag for me.

Ant was developed to solve one problem.  Compile java programs.  Because 
the only other solution at the time was GNU make and it does a horrible 
job of java projects.  People have tried to work with it (out of sheer 
desperation) to make it build other things besides java code, but it is 
the wrong tool for the job.

I also developed CPMake to solve one problem.  "I want to build 
anything".  I must admit that 90% of the coolness in CPMake is not what 
I wrote, but the power of utilizing really awesome scripting languages 
like BeanShell.

So do you agree with me or am I just full of hot air.  I honestly do not 
care if you think I'm on a drug trip, but I want to know why you think 
that way.  Is CPMake lacking somewhere?  If it is I'll fix it, because 
I'm hell bent on making it the coolest make utility on the planet.

Thanks
Brian

Alexey Zinger wrote:

>I presume you felt ant was not enough.  Did you try writing custom tags for it?
> It doesn't seem like your build file is structurally different than what you'd
>write with ant.
>
>--- Brian Hawkins <brianhks-BYHubErIwDGZvNlLnfxc/[email protected]> wrote:
>
>  
>
>>Being frustrated with the lack of flexibility of current make systems I 
>>developed my own.  CPMake is written in Java and the build scripts can 
>>be written in BeanShell.
>>I would like to get some more feedback on this project so I have written 
>>a build script for building BeanShell.  See the attached file.  Save 
>>this file to the root of the BeanShell project and then download the 
>>file cpmake_bsh.jar from the cpmake web site www.cpmake.org.  This file 
>>has the cpmake binaries and the BeanShell 1.3 interpreter in it.
>>
>>You can then build BeanShell by running "java -jar cpmake_bsh.jar <target>"
>>
>>To keep from cluttering up this list with feedback you can send email 
>>directly to me or use the mail list on sourceforge for cpmake.
>>
>>Thanks in advance
>>
>>Brian
>>    
>>
>
>=====
>Alexey
>Briggs & Stratton
>1988 Kawasaki EX500 (CCS)
>http://bsheet.sourceforge.net
>
>
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