From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Existing commands such as DIR in DOS, ls in Unix use > wildcards and add a > 'recurse flag' (/s for dir and -R for ls). I'm not saying > they are the best > way to do it, only the most familiar to users.
The main problem with this approach is that it only allows recursion on the end of the pattern, not on the beginning, which is essential for a number of situations Ant has to deal with, like filtering out CVS directories, filtering out test directories, etc. > I suppose my main point is usability and keeping complexity > low, in the > end, my opinion doesn't matter that much (I'm not a > committer!), and it > certainly seems like I'm in the minority here, so I'm quite > willing (and > happy ) to accept '**' rather than not have it. I also like to keep the complexity low, but I also need the power. Therefore we need to find a balance. On one end of the spectrum we have the DOS/UNIX way with recursion on/off, (less powerful, but rather simple) on the other end we have regular expressions (very powerful, but also complex). The '**' approach ends somewhere in the middle. It gives you enough power, with not too much complexity (actual it is as simple as the DOS/UNIX way, but the only difference, that way you know, and this is new;-) I'll make sure that there are a bunch of examples in the manual for the most common situations, to help users ahead. Cheers, Arnout
