conor 2002/06/19 05:34:59
Modified: proposal/mutant/docs desc.html
proposal/mutant/xdocs/stylesheets project.xml site.vsl
templates.vm
Added: proposal/mutant/docs design.html developers.html
features.html goals.html index.html intro.html
proposal/mutant/xdocs design.xml developers.xml features.xml
goals.xml index.xml
Log:
Some Mutant documentation
Revision Changes Path
1.4 +13 -50 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/docs/desc.html
Index: desc.html
===================================================================
RCS file: /home/cvs/jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/docs/desc.html,v
retrieving revision 1.3
retrieving revision 1.4
diff -u -w -u -r1.3 -r1.4
--- desc.html 31 May 2002 15:15:46 -0000 1.3
+++ desc.html 19 Jun 2002 12:34:58 -0000 1.4
@@ -11,7 +11,7 @@
<meta name="author" value="Conor MacNeill">
<meta name="email" value="">
- <title>The Jakarta Site - Mutant Design Notes</title>
+ <title>Mutant Proposal - Mutant Design Notes</title>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000" link="#525D76">
@@ -31,54 +31,17 @@
<tr>
<!-- LEFT SIDE NAVIGATION -->
<td valign="top" nowrap="true">
- <p><strong>Apache Ant</strong></p>
+ <p><strong>Mutant Proposal</strong></p>
<ul>
- <li> <a href="./index.html">Front Page</a>
+ <li> <a href="./index.html">Introduction</a>
</li>
- <li> <a href="./antnews.html">News</a>
+ <li> <a href="./goals.html">Design Goals</a>
</li>
- <li> <a href="./manual/index.html">Documentation</a>
+ <li> <a href="./features.html">User Features</a>
</li>
- <li> <a href="./external.html">External Tools and Tasks</a>
+ <li> <a href="./developers.html">Task Developers</a>
</li>
- <li> <a href="./resources.html">Resources</a>
- </li>
- <li> <a href="./faq.html">Ant FAQ</a>
- </li>
- <li> <a href="./problems.html">Having Problems?</a>
- </li>
- </ul>
- <p><strong>Download</strong></p>
- <ul>
- <li> <a
href="http://jakarta.apache.org/site/binindex.html";>Binaries</a>
- </li>
- <li> <a
href="http://jakarta.apache.org/site/sourceindex.html";>Source Code</a>
- </li>
- </ul>
- <p><strong>Jakarta</strong></p>
- <ul>
- <li> <a href="http://jakarta.apache.org/site/news.html";>News
& Status</a>
- </li>
- <li> <a
href="http://jakarta.apache.org/site/mission.html";>Mission</a>
- </li>
- <li> <a
href="http://jakarta.apache.org/site/guidelines.html";>Guidelines Notes</a>
- </li>
- <li> <a
href="http://jakarta.apache.org/site/faqs.html";>FAQs</a>
- </li>
- </ul>
- <p><strong>Get Involved</strong></p>
- <ul>
- <li> <a
href="http://jakarta.apache.org/site/getinvolved.html";>Overview</a>
- </li>
- <li> <a
href="http://jakarta.apache.org/site/cvsindex.html";>CVS Repositories</a>
- </li>
- <li> <a
href="http://jakarta.apache.org/site/mail.html";>Mailing Lists</a>
- </li>
- <li> <a
href="http://jakarta.apache.org/site/library.html";>Reference Library</a>
- </li>
- <li> <a
href="http://nagoya.apache.org/bugzilla/enter_bug.cgi?product=Ant";>Bug
Database</a>
- </li>
- <li> <a
href="http://nagoya.apache.org/bugzilla/enter_bug.cgi?product=Ant&bug_severity=Enhancement";>Enhancement
Requests</a>
+ <li> <a href="./design.html">Design Description</a>
</li>
</ul>
</td>
1.1 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/docs/design.html
Index: design.html
===================================================================
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd";>
<!-- Content Stylesheet for Site -->
<!-- start the processing -->
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;
charset=iso-8859-1"/>
<meta name="author" value="Conor MacNeill">
<meta name="email" value="">
<title>Mutant Proposal - Developers</title>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000" link="#525D76">
<table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0">
<!-- TOP IMAGE -->
<tr>
<td colspan="2">
<a href="http://jakarta.apache.org";><img
src="http://jakarta.apache.org/images/jakarta-logo.gif"; align="left"
border="0"/></a>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="4">
<tr><td colspan="2">
<hr noshade="" size="1"/>
</td></tr>
<tr>
<!-- LEFT SIDE NAVIGATION -->
<td valign="top" nowrap="true">
<p><strong>Mutant Proposal</strong></p>
<ul>
<li> <a href="./index.html">Introduction</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./goals.html">Design Goals</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./features.html">User Features</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./developers.html">Task Developers</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./design.html">Design Description</a>
</li>
</ul>
</td>
<td align="left" valign="top">
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Developers"><strong>Developers</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
This page will describe the design of Mutant's core.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
</td>
</tr>
<!-- FOOTER -->
<tr><td colspan="2">
<hr noshade="" size="1"/>
</td></tr>
<tr><td colspan="2">
<div align="center"><font color="#525D76" size="-1"><em>
Copyright © 2000-2002, Apache Software Foundation
</em></font></div>
</td></tr>
</table>
</body>
</html>
<!-- end the processing -->
1.1 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/docs/developers.html
Index: developers.html
===================================================================
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd";>
<!-- Content Stylesheet for Site -->
<!-- start the processing -->
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;
charset=iso-8859-1"/>
<meta name="author" value="Conor MacNeill">
<meta name="email" value="">
<title>Mutant Proposal - Developers</title>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000" link="#525D76">
<table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0">
<!-- TOP IMAGE -->
<tr>
<td colspan="2">
<a href="http://jakarta.apache.org";><img
src="http://jakarta.apache.org/images/jakarta-logo.gif"; align="left"
border="0"/></a>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="4">
<tr><td colspan="2">
<hr noshade="" size="1"/>
</td></tr>
<tr>
<!-- LEFT SIDE NAVIGATION -->
<td valign="top" nowrap="true">
<p><strong>Mutant Proposal</strong></p>
<ul>
<li> <a href="./index.html">Introduction</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./goals.html">Design Goals</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./features.html">User Features</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./developers.html">Task Developers</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./design.html">Design Description</a>
</li>
</ul>
</td>
<td align="left" valign="top">
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Developers"><strong>Developers</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
This page will describe the operation of Mutant from a task developers
perspective.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
</td>
</tr>
<!-- FOOTER -->
<tr><td colspan="2">
<hr noshade="" size="1"/>
</td></tr>
<tr><td colspan="2">
<div align="center"><font color="#525D76" size="-1"><em>
Copyright © 2000-2002, Apache Software Foundation
</em></font></div>
</td></tr>
</table>
</body>
</html>
<!-- end the processing -->
1.1 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/docs/features.html
Index: features.html
===================================================================
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd";>
<!-- Content Stylesheet for Site -->
<!-- start the processing -->
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;
charset=iso-8859-1"/>
<meta name="author" value="Conor MacNeill">
<meta name="email" value="">
<title>Mutant Proposal - Mutant Features</title>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000" link="#525D76">
<table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0">
<!-- TOP IMAGE -->
<tr>
<td colspan="2">
<a href="http://jakarta.apache.org";><img
src="http://jakarta.apache.org/images/jakarta-logo.gif"; align="left"
border="0"/></a>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="4">
<tr><td colspan="2">
<hr noshade="" size="1"/>
</td></tr>
<tr>
<!-- LEFT SIDE NAVIGATION -->
<td valign="top" nowrap="true">
<p><strong>Mutant Proposal</strong></p>
<ul>
<li> <a href="./index.html">Introduction</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./goals.html">Design Goals</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./features.html">User Features</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./developers.html">Task Developers</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./design.html">Design Description</a>
</li>
</ul>
</td>
<td align="left" valign="top">
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="User Features"><strong>User Features</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
This page describes the major features in Mutant which are significantly
different from those of Ant1. These are covered from a user perspective. Other
pages describe the differences from the perspectives of a task developer and
an
Ant core developer.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Directory Layout"><strong>Directory Layout</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
When Mutant is installed, the most immediately obvious difference will be in
the
directory layout, particularly the lib directory. Where Ant1's lib directory
contained ant.jar, optional.jar and the bundled XML jars, Mutant's lib
directory
contain a number of subdirectories.
</p>
<p>
In the root directory, there are a number of jars. These jars are the startup
jars
</p>
<table>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
init.jar
</font>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
a set of low level utility routines required at startup
</font>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
start.jar
</font>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
the Mutant launcher class
</font>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
ant.jar
</font>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
old Ant1 entry point
</font>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>
The subdirectories have the following functions
</p>
<table>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
parser
</font>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
The XML parser jars. This is not available to task libraries unless
they explicitly indicate that it is required.
</font>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
antcore
</font>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
Mutant's core classes. These classes are not available to
tasks.
</font>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
common
</font>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
classes which are available to both the core and all task
libraries.
</font>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
syslibs/antlibs
</font>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
Task libraries. The distinction between the two is
discussed below.
</font>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
frontend
</font>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
Ant Frontends. Different frontends may be plugged in by placing
jars here.
</font>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>
The directory a jar is in will control the visibility of the jar's classes and
resources. This is closely related to the classloader hiearchy used by
Mutant.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Ant Libraries"><strong>Ant Libraries</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Mutant supports the concept of Ant Libraries. These are collections of
components (tasks and types) and their supporting classes packaged into a
Jar. In Mutant each library has a globally unique identifier. This identifier
uses the same conventions as Java package naming - i.e. a reverse DNS name.
</p>
<p> The jar does not need to be exclusively
for Ant. For example, it may be the
jar for a tool which wishes to provide some Ant tasks for using the tool. It
could be the main jar of an appication server that bundles Ant tasks for
deployment. The jar does not even need to be installed in Mutant's antlib
directory - Mutant can be configured to look in jars in other locations for
Ant
Libraries. </p>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Ant library descriptor"><strong>Ant library
descriptor</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Whatever the jar contains and wherever it is located, Mutant looks for an XML
based descriptor in the jar at META-INF/antlib.xml. This XML file describes
the
components in the jar that will be available to Mutant.
</p>
<p>
Here is an example of the descriptor.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
<antlib libid="ant.system"
home="http://jakarta.apache.org/ant">
<taskdef name="libpath"
classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.LibPath"/>
<taskdef name="loadlib"
classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.LoadLib"/>
<taskdef name="import"
classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.Import"/>
<converter
classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.FileConverter"/>
<converter
classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.URLConverter"/>
<converter
classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.PrimitiveConverter"/>
<aspect classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.AntAspect"/>
</antlib>
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<p>
As a user you generally won't need to worry about this decriptor. The library
developer will have developed it to describe their library. Mutant uses the
descriptor to understand what Ant related components the library provides.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Loading libraries"><strong>Loading libraries</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Library management in Mutant is split into two phases - a loading phase and an
import phase. The loading phase is where Mutant loads the antlib.xml
descriptor
from the library. After loading, Mutant knows where the library is located and
what components it provides. In general Mutant will not make the components
available to build scripts automatically. A build script needs to notify
Mutant
what components it is using from each library. This is known as importing.
</p>
<p> Mutant loads libraries from two locations
within the Mutant directory
structure when Mutant starts up - the lib/syslibs and lib/antlibs directories.
The distinction between these two locations is explained in the configuration
discussion below. All jars in these directories will be search for library
descriptors. All libraries providing descriptors will be available for
importing
into builds</p>
<p> In addition to the automatically loaded
libraries, it is possible to
explicitly request additional libraries to be loaded using the
<code><loadlib></code> task. Individual libraries may be loaded or a set
of libraries loaded from a directory. Libraries may also be loaded from remote
locations by specifying a URL. The loadlib task can request that all
components
in the loaded library also be imported at the time of loading. Examples of the
loadlib task follow </p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
<!-- load a library from a specific file and import all components -->
<loadlib file="/opt/tools/toollib.jar"
importall="true"/>
<!-- load all libraries from a directory -->
<loadlib dir="/opt/appserver/lib/"/>
<!-- load libraries from a remote server -->
<loadlib url="http://jakarta.apache.org/ant/testtasks.jar"/>
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<p>
In general the loading of libraries from absolute locations would be a
configuration task. These would be specified in the Mutant configuration file
and would not be used in a build file. The loading of project libraries from
relative locations may be something that you would see in a build file.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Importing components"><strong>Importing
components</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Mutant is designed to allow tasks to be defined simply by dropping a jar in a
directory or configuring Mutant to look in particular places for jars. This
will
allow tasks and types developed by many different developers to be used. With
many developers developing tasks, however, inevitably some tasks will end up
with the same name.
</p>
<p>
This is very similar to the situation faced by Java with Java class names.
Many Java classes have the same name. When a Java programmer uses a class they
must import that class with an import statement. This tells the Java compiler
which particular class is being referenced by the classname. Effectively the
import statement creates a mapping from a name used in the Java source file
and
a class in the global package namespace.
</p>
<p>
Mutant provides an import task to specify, in a manner similar to Java's
import
statement, which components are being used. When a component is imported the
library is identified by its unique id. By default the component is imported
into the frame using the name it is known by within the library. When this
would
conflict with a name that has already been imported, the import task allows
the
component to be given a new name, or alias, by which it will be referenced. It
is also possible to import all the components in a library. The folowing
example
shows the various methods by which the import task can be used to import
components.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
<!-- import the runtool task from the com.foo.tools library -->
<import libraryId="com.foo.tools" name="runtool"/>
<!-- import the runtool task from the com.bar.tools library and
alias it since the runtool is already defined -->
<import libraryId="com.bar.tools" name="runtool"
alias="runbartool"/>
<!-- import all of the tasks from the com.fubar.tools library -->
<import libraryId="com.fubar.tools"/>
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<p>
By using library identifiers, import operations are not tied to a particular
library location. The separation of the loading and importing into separate
phases allows environment-dependent locations to be specified as configuration
information and location independent importing to be specified in the build
file. This is similar to the case of Java imports. Java classes are imported
by
their global name without needing to known where the classfile is that
contains
that class. That information is provided externally in the CLASSPATH variable.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Library classpath management"><strong>Library classpath
management</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Many libraries will have dependencies on external jars. For example, a task
might make use of regular-expression libraries such as jakarta-regexp or a
task
may provide a wrapper around some external tool. In these cases the task will
usually need to have the required classes available in the classloader from
which the task itself was loaded. It is possible to avoid these direct
dependencies using techniques such as reflection and explicitly loading the
required classes through additional classloaders but the code is often harder
to
write and understand.
</p>
<p> It is not always possible or desirable to
bundle the required classes in the
task's jar nor is it desirable that the system classpath contains the required
classes. In fact it is often preferable to run Mutant with an empty classpath.
Buildfiles which do not assume that the system classpath contains particular
classes are generally more portable. Mutant provides a task,
<code><libpath></code>, to allow additional paths to be assodicated
with a
library. As with the loadlib task, the libpath task may be used to associate a
single file, all jars in a directory or remote jars with a library. </p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
<libpath libraryid="ant.ant1compat"
dir="/home/conor/jakarta-ant/lib/optional/"/>
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<p> The above example associates all the jars
in
/home/conor/jakarta-ant/lib/optional/ with the library whose unique id is
ant.ant1compat. A path must be associated with a library before any components
are imported from the library. Mutant associates the paths with the library
and
at the time a component is requested from the library, Mutant will form the
classloader that will be used. The additional paths are added to the
definition
of the classloader. Once a component is loaded, further paths will not have
any
effect. For this reason, and since the additonal paths are likely to be
absolute
paths, the <code><libpath></code> task is normally used in Mutant's
configuration phase. </p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Automatic Imports"><strong>Automatic Imports</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Mutant will automatically import all components of any library whose unique
identifier begins with "ant." when the ;library is loaded. This is
mainly a convenience to provide a minimum set of tasks with which to construct
build files.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Includes"><strong>Includes</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>Mutant provides a mechanism for including build
file fragments into a build
file. This following example illustrates how this works</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
build.ant
==========
<project default="main"
xmlns:ant="http://jakarta.apache.org/ant">
<ant:include fragment="fragment.ant"/>
</project>
fragment.ant
============
<fragment>
<target name="main">
<echo message="main target"/>
</target>
</fragment>
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<p> The include mechanism can be used to
include a complete project file or as
shown in the example, a fragment. When including a project, any attributes on
the included <code><project></code> element are ignored and the contents
of the project inserted into the including project. In all cases the included
files must be a well formed XML file containing a root element. </p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p><font color="red">This area of Mutant is subject to change.</font></p>
<p>At present include elements are processed at parse-time. As such they can
only occur at the top-level of the build file. They cannot occur in a target.
The use of the namespace to qualify the include element is intended to convey
the fact that this is not part of the build structure.</p>
<p>An alternative approach would be to define include as a regular task. When
an
include is processed, the top-level tasks of the included project would be
executed immediately and the targets added to the current project
structure.</p>.
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Project References"><strong>Project References</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"
width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Creating references"><strong>Creating references</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Mutant allows build file writers to reference properties and targets in other
projects by creating a project reference. Project references are introduced
using the ref task.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
<!-- create a reference to the main build -->
<ref project="main.xml" name="main"/>
<ref project="test.xml" name="test">
<property name=build.dir" value="build/test"/>
</ref>
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<p>
The above example creates two project references - one to the build in
main.xml
and one to the build in test.xml. When a reference is created, it must be
given
a label. This label will be used to refer to items within the referenced
project (see below). Note that the ref task is a regular task and the
reference
is only created when the ref task is executed. A ref task may be placed at the
top level of a build to effectively create static references. Alternatively a
reference may be created dynamically by putting the ref task in a target.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Referencing project items"><strong>Referencing project
items</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
The label given to a project reference is used when accessing items within the
project. So, to access the build.dir property in the project referenced by the
main label, you would use main:build.dir. Similarly the compile target would
be
referred to as main:compile. Since the referenced projects may also create
their
own project references, labels may be concatenated to access items at
arbitrary
depths. For example, if main.xml referenced another project under the label
"sub", a property debug could be referenced as main:sub:debug. The
following example shows various items in the referenced project being used.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
<!-- Specify the build.dir in the main project prior to the reference
being created -->
<property name="main:build.dir"
value="build/main"/>
<!-- create the reference to the main build -->
<ref project="main.xml" name="main"/>
<!-- create the reference to the test build -->
<ref project="test.xml" name="test">
<property name="build.dir" value="build/test"/>
</ref>
<!-- our main target calls the fubar target in the main build -->
<target name="main">
<antcall target="main:fubar"/>
</target>
<!-- Our alt target depends on the fubar target in the main build -->
<target name="alt" depends="main:fubar">
<echo message="main's debug flag is ${main:debug}"/>
</target>
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<p>
When a project is referenced, the top level tasks of the referenced project
are
run to allow the project to initialize itself. Mutant allows the referring
build to set a property in a referenced project before the reference is
created. When the reference is eventually created these properties are set
before initialization occurs. In normal Ant fashion, these overriding
properties take precedence. In particular properties in the referenced
projects
may be set from the command line as this example shows
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
mutant -Dmain:build.dir=temp
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<p>
The example above shows a target in the referenced project being used as a
dependency and also as a target in an antcall. Since refs are dynamic, Mutant
will only evaluate such dependencies when required. If the alt target were
never to be run, the dependency on main:fubar would never be checked.
</p>
<p>
The import task allows components defined in a referenced project to be
brought
into the main build. For example, the following will bring the definition of
tool from the test project in the build. The imported component may also be
aliased to a new name.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
<!-- import a task definition from another project -->
<import ref="test:tool"/>
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Configuration"><strong>Configuration</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
As discussed above Mutant provides a number of tasks to manage libraries and
it is appropriate to run many of these tasks as part of a user or system-wide
configuration rather than incorporating them into the build file. Mutant
provides a configuration system to support running these tasks at an
appropriate
time. A Mutant configuration file looks as follows
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
<antconfig allow-unset-properties="true">
<global-tasks>
<libpath libraryid="ant.ant1compat"
file="/home/conor/dev/jakarta-ant/lib/optional/"/>
</global-tasks>
<project-tasks>
<import libraryid="antopt.monitor"/>
</project-tasks>
</antconfig>
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<p>
The antconfig element is the root element of the configuration file. It
supports
three attributes
</p>
<table>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
allow-unset-properties
</font>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
controls whether Mutant will fail a build which
refers to a property which has not been set. This defaults to the Ant1
behaviour
(true)
</font>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
allow-remote-library
</font>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
controls whether Mutant uses components defined in remote libraries
</font>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
allow-remote-project
</font>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#a0ddf0" colspan="" rowspan=""
valign="top" align="left">
<font color="#000000" size="-1" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
controls whether Mutant can run a project or reference a project
which is
located remotely.
</font>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>
The configuration provides two collections of configuration tasks,
global-tasks
and project-tasks. Global-tasks are run once and are run in the context of the
main project - i.e. the build file identified on the command line (defaults to
build.xml/build.ant), whilst project-tasks are run as part of the
initialization
of every project including referenced projects and antcall projects. Looking
at
the above example, the global-tasks associate a path with the ant.ant1compat
library while the per-project tasks import the antopt.monitor library into
every
project that Mutant processes.
</p>
<p>
The tasks that can be run in the configuration phase are regular tasks but not
all tasks are automatically available. This is the difference between the
syslibs and antlibs directories. The global tasks are run after the syslibs
libraries have been loaded but prior to the antlibs libraries being loaded.
The
syslibs library tasks are therefore available in the configuration phase. This
arrangement is to allow the configuration tasks to setup library paths for the
libraries contained in the antlibs directory, especially libraries in the Ant
namespace which are automatically imported at the time they are loaded.
</p>
<p>
If it is required to use tasks from libraries installed in the antlibs
directory, the configuration tasks may explicitly load the library and import
the required tasks. The following example shows the loading and use of the
echo
task in the configuration tasks. Note that the ant.home property has been set
at
the time the configuration tasks are started.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
<antconfig allow-unset-properties="true">
<global-tasks>
<loadlib file="${ant.home}/lib/antlibs/ant1compat.jar"
importall="true"/>
<echo message="Starting the build"/>
</global-tasks>
<project-tasks>
<echo message="Starting new project"/>
</project-tasks>
</antconfig>
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<p>
When Mutant starts up it will load configurations from two locations - The
file
.ant/conf/antconfig.xml in the user's home directory and the file
conf/antconfig.xml in the Mutant home directory. In addition, config files can
be specified on the command line using a -config argument. This allows project
specific configurations to be used.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Targetless builds"><strong>Targetless builds</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Mutant allows any task or datatype to be placed outside of a target. All such
components are processed when the project is initialized and before any
targets
are processed. In fact Mutant does not require that a project contain any
targets. In this case the only operations performed are the top level tasks at
project initialization. The following shows a simple example
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
<project>
<echo message="Welcome to Mutant"/>
</project>
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Extensibility"><strong>Extensibility</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Normally when a task supports a nested element, Ant automatically determines
the
type of the nested element and creates an instance of this type. This
instance is
then configured and passed to the task. Mutant extends this scheme by allowing
a build file writer to specify the type of nested element to use rather than
relying on the core to determine it. Mutant will process attributes and
further
nested elements based on the specified type. For example:
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
<copy todir="dest">
<fileset xsi:type="classfileset"
dir="../../bin/ant1compat/">
<root classname="org.apache.tools.ant.Project"/>
</fileset>
</copy>
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<p>
In this example the nested element is actually a classfileset which supports
the
<root> nested element. The actual type is specified using the notation
from
XML Schema. Mutant predclares the XML Schema namespace under the xsi prefix.
You
may explicitly declare this in the build file's XML and use a different prefix
if you wish. For example, this is equivalent to the above
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff"><pre>
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<project xmlns:schema="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
name="test" default="main">
<target name="main">
<delete dir="dest"/>
<mkdir dir="dest"/>
<copy todir="dest">
<fileset schema:type="classfileset"
dir="../../bin/ant1compat/">
<root classname="org.apache.tools.ant.Project"/>
</fileset>
</copy>
</target>
</project>
</pre></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Default build file"><strong>Default build file</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>In Ant1, the default build file name is build.xml.
In Mutant, the default
build file is build.ant. If build.xnt cannot be found, Mutant will then look
for
build.xml. This allows you to support both Ant1 and Ant2 users. The build.xml
file can contain an Ant1 build file. The build.ant file can include or
reference
this build and make use of Mutant's capabilities such as library management,
library path settings, etc.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
</td>
</tr>
<!-- FOOTER -->
<tr><td colspan="2">
<hr noshade="" size="1"/>
</td></tr>
<tr><td colspan="2">
<div align="center"><font color="#525D76" size="-1"><em>
Copyright © 2002, Apache Software Foundation
</em></font></div>
</td></tr>
</table>
</body>
</html>
<!-- end the processing -->
1.1 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/docs/goals.html
Index: goals.html
===================================================================
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd";>
<!-- Content Stylesheet for Site -->
<!-- start the processing -->
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;
charset=iso-8859-1"/>
<meta name="author" value="Conor MacNeill">
<meta name="email" value="">
<title>Mutant Proposal - Mutant Goals</title>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000" link="#525D76">
<table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0">
<!-- TOP IMAGE -->
<tr>
<td colspan="2">
<a href="http://jakarta.apache.org";><img
src="http://jakarta.apache.org/images/jakarta-logo.gif"; align="left"
border="0"/></a>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="4">
<tr><td colspan="2">
<hr noshade="" size="1"/>
</td></tr>
<tr>
<!-- LEFT SIDE NAVIGATION -->
<td valign="top" nowrap="true">
<p><strong>Mutant Proposal</strong></p>
<ul>
<li> <a href="./index.html">Introduction</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./goals.html">Design Goals</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./features.html">User Features</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./developers.html">Task Developers</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./design.html">Design Description</a>
</li>
</ul>
</td>
<td align="left" valign="top">
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Goals"><strong>Goals</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
This page describes the key goals that have shaped the development of
Mutant.
</p>
<p>
The first section identifies a set of issues with Ant1 that have cropped up as
Ant1 has evolved. The design implications of each issue are then summarized
as a
Mutant requirement. I do not want to suggest that these problems are
unsolvable
within the Ant1 design. Already I believe we have seen the Ant2 proposals
influencing people trying to extend Ant1. These issues may be solvable,
although at
the risk of backward compatability impacts or further complication of the Ant1
codebase.
</p>
<p>
The second section covers a set of additional requirements that have emerged
as
the whole concept of Ant2 has developed. Many of these came from the
discussions
on the Ant-Dev mailing list.
</p>
<p>
The realisation of these requirements as they impact a user is on the
<a href="features.html">next page</a>. Th implications for task developers and
Ant developers are discussed in the following sections.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Ant1 Issues"><strong>Ant1 Issues</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"
width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Unrestricted core access"><strong>Unrestricted core
access</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
The interface between the Ant core and tasks is not controlled. It
allows tasks almost complete access to the internal data structures of the
core. This is poor encapsulation. Whilst most tasks do not need and do not
use this access, its existence nonetheless prevents changes being made to
the core without raising concerns about impacting backward compatability.
</p>
<p>
The uncontrolled nature of the task-core interface also makes it difficult
to reuse tasks and types in a different context without almost completely
duplicating the Ant core
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
A tightly defined interface between the core and the components (tasks and
types) will allow the core implementation to be changed without the risk
of impacting tasks. It will also allow components to be reused in other
contexts.
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Lack of embedding support"><strong>Lack of embedding
support</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Ant1 does not provide strong support for embedding Ant in other systems,
particularly a GUI or IDE. The development of Antidote highlighted this
difficultly. Antidote was forced to perform its own XML parsing so it could
build its own model of the build. There is no communication medium for a GUI
to
communicate with the core. Without this capability any GUI will be limited to
simply editing the XML representation of the build.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
The definition of a project model, a Java-based object-model of a build
description would decouple Ant from the XML representation. This allows
other representations to be used. Such an object model also forms the basis
for communications between systems which want to embed Ant. An IDE could
manipulate this project object model directly and pass to the core for
processing without needing to convert to and from an external
representations such as XML.
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Configuration done at Parse-Time"><strong>Configuration done
at Parse-Time</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
The original implementation of Ant1 performed all task configuration at the
time the XML description of the build was parsed (parse-time). This approach
could not handle dynamically created tasks very well since in some
instances the type of the task to be configured was not known at parse-time.
This limitation was overcome with the introduction of the UnknownElement and
RuntimeConfigurable classes. While these work well, they are confusing and at
times surprising to most Ant developers. Also some operations still occur at
parse-time, notably creation of nested elements of known types. This could be
overcome by going to a fully dynamic model but the fear of backward
incompatability constrains this change from occuring.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
Execution-time configuration of tasks allows for the latest information to be
used for configuration. It is also necessary to support the concept of the
project model. The project model cannot contain execution-time information as
it
does in Ant1
</p>
<p>
The decoupling of the parsing and exection phases, communicating through the
medium of the project model will allow the core to be modularized. The parsing
and execution phases can be separated and one replaced without impacting the
other.
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Multiple execution"><strong>Multiple execution</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
In Ant1, a task, once configured, may be used more than once - i.e. its
execute method may be called more than once. This occurs when the Ant
command line specifies the evaluation of two targets. If those targets have
overlapping dependencies, the tasks in those overlapping dependencies will
be executed twice. This arrangement requires task writers to preserve the
state configured by Ant during the execution of the task so that the next
execution has the correct configuration.
</p>
<p>
Many task writers are not aware of this requirement. Frequently the task's
state is changed during the execution method, which can lead to mysterious
falures during subsequent executions. This need to preserve the configuration
state makes writing tasks much harder.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
Once a task is configured, it should be executed once. If the execution of
multiple targets is required, a new task instance should be created and
configured from the same project model. If reuse of task instances is desired
each instance must be reinitialized and reconfigured before use.
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="No automatic deployment of tasks"><strong>No automatic
deployment of tasks</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Ant1 has a set of well-known tasks (and types). A well-known task is one
for which a mapping between the taskname and its implementing class is
predefined in Ant. This mapping is provided by the two defaults.properties
files in Ant's code. These well-known tasks do not need to be taskdef'd to
make them available in a build file. Conversely tasks which are not in this
list need to be explicitly taskdef'd.
</p>
<p>
Note that this distinction is not the same as the core/optional
distinction found in Ant1. An Ant1 core task is notionally supported by Ant
without requiring any additional external libraries - it just requires the
classes available in the 1.1 JDK, in Ant and in the libraries Ant uses such
as the XML parser. An optional task is a task which requires JDK 1.2+
features or the support of an external library, such as jakarta-regexp.
</p>
<p>
The problem with this system is that there is no namespace management. If a
new task is added to Ant, it may invalidate buildfiles which are already
using that taskname via a taskdef. Actually the taskdef may continue to work
or
it may not - it will depend on the nested elements that the task definitions
support (see above discussion of regarding cofiguration at parse-time)
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
Tasks need to be deployed in libraries by either placing them in well known
directories of an Ant install or by telling Ant where to look for them.
Removing
the central management of defined task names allows tasks libraries to be
developed and maintained independently of Ant much more easily.
</p>
<p>
Once centralised management of the task namespace is removed, there is,
however, the possibility of name collision. A mechanism is required to allow a
build file writer to select which particular tasks are assigned to which
tasknames.
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Top level tasks"><strong>Top level tasks</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
In Ant1 certain tasks may appear outside of any target. This is implemented
as a
set of hardcoded conditions in the XML parsing phase. The execution and
configuration of these tasks does not involve the use of RuntimeConfigurable
and
UnknownElement.
</p>
<p>
This hardcoding is not very inituitive. It is confusing to users who do not
know why only some tasks may be run outside of a target. Also as the list of
tasks that may be useful as a top-level task grows, further special cases must
be added to the code making the code harder to maintain.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
The number of special names should be kept to a minimum. Special cases should
be avoided as they are not inituitive.
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Build file inclusion is cumbersome"><strong>Build file
inclusion is cumbersome</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
In Ant1, the inclusion of a set of build file definitions or targets is
achieved
through the use of XML entities. This is just cumbersome.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
A simplified include mechanism is required to replace the entity based
inclusion of Ant1.
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Classpath management"><strong>Classpath
management</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Probably the greatest issue facing Ant1 today involves the management of the
classpath and the associated visibility of classes. Most optional tasks in
Ant1
require the supporting classes for the task to be available on the system
classpath. For example, the JUnit task is only usable if the JUnit jar is on
the classpath. If it is not, Ant will complain about being unable to create
the
junit task.
</p>
<p>
The usual solution when a user runs into this problem is to put the required
jar
into the ANT_HOME/lib directory. This just adds the required jar to the system
classpath prior to starting Ant albeit without requiring the user to
explicitly
set the classpath.
</p>
<p>
There are a number of issues with this approach. The classes on the
classpath share the same classloader as Ant's classes and Ant's support
libraries - particularly the XML parser. If a task wishes to use a specific
XML
parser, it may conflict with Ant's own parser. If two tasks require different
versions of a supporting jar, these will conflict.
</p>
<p>
Many tasks make use of factory objects (dynamic class instantiation, dynamic
resource loading, etc). When the factory is in the system classpath it will
not
be able to load resources available in a taskdef'd task's custom classpath due
to the delegating nature of classloaders. Such errors can be very confusing to
users. More recent code is likely to attempt use of a context classloader but
this is not set by Ant1 currently.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
Do not require jars to be added to ANT_HOME/lib to enable tasks. Allow users
to
specify the location of support jars on a per-library basis.
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Extensibility"><strong>Extensibility</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
The earliest versions Ant1 did not explicitly support any datatypes. The only
datatype, property, was actually created as a side-effect of running the
<code><property></code> task. If it were to be implemented today,
property
would probably be known as a string datatype, perhaps associated with a
<code><load-properties></code> task. This is also the reason property
is one of those tasks which is allowed to exist outside of a target.
</p>
<p> As Ant1 evolved new types such as
<code><path></code> and
<code><fileset></code> were added. The concept of datatypes has
continued
to evolve to the point where users can now define new datatypes. It would be
expected that in addition to new types there will be many sub-types created,
such as new types of fileset. Ant1, however, does not strongly support such
type
extensibility. When a subtype is created by extending an existing type, Ant1
requires it to be either used by reference or all tasks which accept the base
type need to be modified to support the new type. Use by reference is not
always
possible. It will depend on whether the base type has been coded to support
references. </p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
Support polymorphic behaviour, allowing a build file to pass a subtype to a
task which is defined to accept the base type. Allow task interfaces to be
defined in terms of interfaces.
</p>
<p>
Move reference processing to the core to make it more regular removing the
burden of type developers to explicitly support references.
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Project object does too much"><strong>Project object does
too much</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
In Ant1 the Project object takes on too many roles including all of the
following:
</p>
<ul>
<li>Holds the project model built when parsing the build file</li>
<li>Holds the run-time state of the build through the properties and current
task definitions</li>
<li>Provides context for task execution. All tasks have a reference to their
project instance and use it to access core functions</li>
<li>Provides the implementation of common task operations</li>
<li>Build event management</li>
<li>Message logging</li>
<li>Global filter definitions</li>
<li>Java Version</li>
<li>Property replacement</li>
<li>Message Levels</li>
<li>Utility functions such as boolean conversion and path translation</li>
<li>Integration point for embedding Ant</li>
</ul>
<p> As a class, Project is not cohesive.
Reuse of the Ant core functionality is
difficulty as all of these concerns bring in many other support classes.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
Separate the various roles of Project into more cohesive classes.
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Other Goals"><strong>Other Goals</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
In addition to the issues which arise from Ant1 limitations, there are a
number
of requirements which have emerged in the mailing list discussions about Ant2.
This isn't a complete list - just the ones I picked up for Mutant.
</p>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Limited project reuse"><strong>Limited project
reuse</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p> In Ant1 the only way to reuse build file
definitions is to use the
<code><ant></code> task. While useful, it is relatively coarse-grained.
It
can also be tedious if you are trying to extend an existing project
definition -
that is, adding new targets while retaining a user's ability to access the
existing targets. </p>
<p>
In addition to the extension of projects, it should be possible to compose
projects creating dependencies between the targets of the different projects,
and to access the data and definitions of one project by a controlling project
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
Allow a project to extend and control other projects
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Ant1 Compatibility - Zero Friction"><strong>Ant1
Compatibility - Zero Friction</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
While it has always been accepted that there will be come backward
compatibility
breaks in moving from Ant1 to Ant2, these should be minimized. If the
changeover
from Ant1 to Ant2 is difficult, it may never happen. On the other hand, the
openness of the Ant1 interface means that some tasks will not work as
expected -
the most difficult being the <code><script></code> task.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
Achieve a practical level of compatability without degrading the integrity of
the core's interfaces. A practical level of compatability is intentionally a
vague measure but it would require the majority of projects in Gump to be
built
without noticeable differences from Ant1
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="XML Configuration"><strong>XML Configuration</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
In Ant1 configuration of Ant is achieved either through the execution of OS
dependent scripts by the launcher scripts or though properties files which
have
the limited capability to set properties.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
Provide an XML based configuration system with rich capabilities to configure
the operation of Ant.
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0"
cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#828DA6">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Aspects"><strong>Aspects</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
In Ant1 there are many things which are common to a group of tasks but adding
the capability to each task is repetitive and tedious. An example would be the
failonerror attribute which controls whether a task will cause the build to
stop
when it fails. This started on just one task but has since been added to many
other tasks as users want more fine control over when their builds stop.
Aspects
have been discussed as a mechanism for providing a single implementation of a
concept or control that can then be applied to tasks independently.
</p>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<p>
Investigate the use of an Aspect approach to provide common functionality
across tasks with a single implementation
</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
</td>
</tr>
<!-- FOOTER -->
<tr><td colspan="2">
<hr noshade="" size="1"/>
</td></tr>
<tr><td colspan="2">
<div align="center"><font color="#525D76" size="-1"><em>
Copyright © 2002, Apache Software Foundation
</em></font></div>
</td></tr>
</table>
</body>
</html>
<!-- end the processing -->
1.1 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/docs/index.html
Index: index.html
===================================================================
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd";>
<!-- Content Stylesheet for Site -->
<!-- start the processing -->
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;
charset=iso-8859-1"/>
<meta name="author" value="Conor MacNeill">
<meta name="email" value="">
<title>Mutant Proposal - Mutant Introduction</title>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000" link="#525D76">
<table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0">
<!-- TOP IMAGE -->
<tr>
<td colspan="2">
<a href="http://jakarta.apache.org";><img
src="http://jakarta.apache.org/images/jakarta-logo.gif"; align="left"
border="0"/></a>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="4">
<tr><td colspan="2">
<hr noshade="" size="1"/>
</td></tr>
<tr>
<!-- LEFT SIDE NAVIGATION -->
<td valign="top" nowrap="true">
<p><strong>Mutant Proposal</strong></p>
<ul>
<li> <a href="./index.html">Introduction</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./goals.html">Design Goals</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./features.html">User Features</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./developers.html">Task Developers</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./design.html">Design Description</a>
</li>
</ul>
</td>
<td align="left" valign="top">
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Introduction"><strong>Introduction</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
These pages describe the design and implementation of Mutant.
</p>
<p>
For some time, there has been the concept of Ant 2.0. a rearchitecting of
Ant designed to address the shortcomings in the design of Ant 1.x, while
drawing the experience gained in that development. This rearchitecting
would most likely be accompanied by at least some break in backward
compatability. Over time Ant 2.0 has come to be known as Ant2 and the current
Ant codebase is generally known as Ant1.
</p>
<p>
Mutant is my proposal, a revolution, for Ant2. Actually, I consider it more
an evolution of the design and implementation used for Ant1, but in Jakarta
parlance, being a separate codebase, it is termed a revolution.
</p>
<p>
There is no special significance in the name Mutant. I chose it because, as
a word, it is an extension of the word Ant and it also signifies a change
from the previous generation
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Other Proposals"><strong>Other Proposals</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Mutant is not the only proposed revolution for Ant2. Peter Donald has
developed another known as
<a href="http://jakarta.apache.org/ant/myrmidon";>Myrmidon</a>
which presents a different view of how Ant2 could be realized. Other
people hold the view that Ant1 can continue to evolve and that there
is no need for rearchitecture of its codebase. I recommend you
investigate all these points of view.
</p>
<p>
As I write this, no decision has been taken as to which codebase will be
adopted for Ant2. It may not be Mutant and it could even be some entirely
new proposal. These pages do not compare and contrast Mutant with these
other proposals or points of view, at least not explicitly. They are just
intended to describe how Mutant is designed and implemented and why it is the
way it is.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Getting Started"><strong>Getting Started</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<div align="left">
<table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#ffffff">
<h1><font color="red">Caution</font></h1>
<p>
Mutant is not even an alpha release. While it is relatively stable, it is
subject to change. There are no backward compatability guarantees for any of
the classes, interfaces, build files, configuration, launch scripts, etc that
Mutant provides.
</p>
<p>In particular, some features in Mutant are experimental and may not, in the
long run, prove to be worthwhile.</p>
</td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif" width="1"
height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
<td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<p>
<a href="goals.html">Start</a> now by looking at the key requirements which
have
shaped the design of Mutant.
</p>
<div align="right">
<p>Conor MacNeill</p>
</div>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
</td>
</tr>
<!-- FOOTER -->
<tr><td colspan="2">
<hr noshade="" size="1"/>
</td></tr>
<tr><td colspan="2">
<div align="center"><font color="#525D76" size="-1"><em>
Copyright © 2002, Apache Software Foundation
</em></font></div>
</td></tr>
</table>
</body>
</html>
<!-- end the processing -->
1.1 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/docs/intro.html
Index: intro.html
===================================================================
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd";>
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<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;
charset=iso-8859-1"/>
<meta name="author" value="Conor MacNeill">
<meta name="email" value="">
<title>Mutant Proposal - Mutant Introduction</title>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000" link="#525D76">
<table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0">
<!-- TOP IMAGE -->
<tr>
<td colspan="2">
<a href="http://jakarta.apache.org";><img
src="http://jakarta.apache.org/images/jakarta-logo.gif"; align="left"
border="0"/></a>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="4">
<tr><td colspan="2">
<hr noshade="" size="1"/>
</td></tr>
<tr>
<!-- LEFT SIDE NAVIGATION -->
<td valign="top" nowrap="true">
<p><strong>Mutant Proposal</strong></p>
<ul>
<li> <a href="./intro.html">Introduction</a>
</li>
<li> <a href="./goals.html">Design Goals</a>
</li>
</ul>
</td>
<td align="left" valign="top">
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Introduction"><strong>Introduction</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
These pages describe the design and implementation of mutant.
</p>
<p>
For some time, there has been the concept of Ant 2.0. a rearchitecting of
Ant designed to address the shortcomings in the design of Ant 1.x while
drawing the experience gained in that development. This rearchitecting
would most likely be accompanied by at least some break in backward
compatability. Indeed this fact was recognized by Duncan, the original
author of Ant when he proposed his AntEater revolution. Over time Ant 2.0
has come to be known as Ant2 and the current Ant codebase is generally
known as Ant1.
</p>
<p>
Mutant is my proposal, a revolution, for Ant2. Actually, I consider it more
an evolution of the design and implementation used for Ant1, but in Jakarta
parlance, being a separate codebase, it is termed a revolution.
</p>
<p>
There is no special significance in the name mutant. I chose it because, as
a word, it is an extension of the word ant and it also signifies a change
from the previos generation
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" width="100%">
<tr><td bgcolor="#525D76">
<font color="#ffffff" face="arial,helvetica,sanserif">
<a name="Other Proposals"><strong>Other Proposals</strong></a>
</font>
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
<blockquote>
<p>
Mutant is not the only proposed revolution for Ant2. Peter Donald, another
Ant committer, has developed another proposal known as Myrmidon, which you
should also investigate if you are interested in a different view of how
Ant2 should be realized. Other people hold the view that there is no need
for any rearchitecting and the Ant1 codebase can continue to evolve.
</p>
<p>
As I write this, no decision has been taken as to which codebase will be
adopted for Ant2. It may not be mutant or it could be some entirely new
proposal. This document does not compare and contrast mutant with these
other proposals or points of view, at least not explicitly. It is just
intended to describe and highlight how mutant is designed and implemented.
</p>
</blockquote>
</td></tr>
</table>
</td>
</tr>
<!-- FOOTER -->
<tr><td colspan="2">
<hr noshade="" size="1"/>
</td></tr>
<tr><td colspan="2">
<div align="center"><font color="#525D76" size="-1"><em>
Copyright © 2000-2002, Apache Software Foundation
</em></font></div>
</td></tr>
</table>
</body>
</html>
<!-- end the processing -->
1.1 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/xdocs/design.xml
Index: design.xml
===================================================================
<document>
<properties>
<author email="">Conor MacNeill</author>
<title>Developers</title>
</properties>
<body>
<section name="Developers">
<p>
This page will describe the design of Mutant's core.
</p>
</section>
</body>
</document>
1.1 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/xdocs/developers.xml
Index: developers.xml
===================================================================
<document>
<properties>
<author email="">Conor MacNeill</author>
<title>Developers</title>
</properties>
<body>
<section name="Developers">
<p>
This page will describe the operation of Mutant from a task developers
perspective.
</p>
</section>
</body>
</document>
1.1 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/xdocs/features.xml
Index: features.xml
===================================================================
<document>
<properties>
<author email="">Conor MacNeill</author>
<title>Mutant Features</title>
</properties>
<body>
<section name="User Features">
<p>
This page describes the major features in Mutant which are significantly
different from those of Ant1. These are covered from a user perspective. Other
pages describe the differences from the perspectives of a task developer and
an
Ant core developer.
</p>
</section>
<section name="Directory Layout">
<p>
When Mutant is installed, the most immediately obvious difference will be in
the
directory layout, particularly the lib directory. Where Ant1's lib directory
contained ant.jar, optional.jar and the bundled XML jars, Mutant's lib
directory
contain a number of subdirectories.
</p>
<p>
In the root directory, there are a number of jars. These jars are the startup
jars
</p>
<table>
<tr>
<td>init.jar</td>
<td>a set of low level utility routines required at startup</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>start.jar</td>
<td>the Mutant launcher class</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>ant.jar</td>
<td>old Ant1 entry point</td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>
The subdirectories have the following functions
</p>
<table>
<tr>
<td>parser</td>
<td>The XML parser jars. This is not available to task libraries unless
they explicitly indicate that it is required.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>antcore</td>
<td>Mutant's core classes. These classes are not available to
tasks.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>common</td>
<td>classes which are available to both the core and all task
libraries.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>syslibs/antlibs</td>
<td>Task libraries. The distinction between the two is
discussed below.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>frontend</td>
<td>Ant Frontends. Different frontends may be plugged in by placing
jars here.</td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>
The directory a jar is in will control the visibility of the jar's classes and
resources. This is closely related to the classloader hiearchy used by
Mutant.
</p>
</section>
<section name="Ant Libraries">
<p>
Mutant supports the concept of Ant Libraries. These are collections of
components (tasks and types) and their supporting classes packaged into a
Jar. In Mutant each library has a globally unique identifier. This identifier
uses the same conventions as Java package naming - i.e. a reverse DNS name.
</p>
<p> The jar does not need to be exclusively for Ant. For example, it may be
the
jar for a tool which wishes to provide some Ant tasks for using the tool. It
could be the main jar of an appication server that bundles Ant tasks for
deployment. The jar does not even need to be installed in Mutant's antlib
directory - Mutant can be configured to look in jars in other locations for
Ant
Libraries. </p>
<subsection name="Ant library descriptor">
<p>
Whatever the jar contains and wherever it is located, Mutant looks for an XML
based descriptor in the jar at META-INF/antlib.xml. This XML file describes
the
components in the jar that will be available to Mutant.
</p>
<p>
Here is an example of the descriptor.
</p>
<source><![CDATA[
<antlib libid="ant.system"
home="http://jakarta.apache.org/ant";>
<taskdef name="libpath" classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.LibPath"/>
<taskdef name="loadlib" classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.LoadLib"/>
<taskdef name="import" classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.Import"/>
<converter classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.FileConverter"/>
<converter classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.URLConverter"/>
<converter classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.PrimitiveConverter"/>
<aspect classname="org.apache.ant.antlib.system.AntAspect"/>
</antlib>
]]></source>
<p>
As a user you generally won't need to worry about this decriptor. The library
developer will have developed it to describe their library. Mutant uses the
descriptor to understand what Ant related components the library provides.
</p>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Loading libraries">
<p>
Library management in Mutant is split into two phases - a loading phase and an
import phase. The loading phase is where Mutant loads the antlib.xml
descriptor
from the library. After loading, Mutant knows where the library is located and
what components it provides. In general Mutant will not make the components
available to build scripts automatically. A build script needs to notify
Mutant
what components it is using from each library. This is known as importing.
</p>
<p> Mutant loads libraries from two locations within the Mutant directory
structure when Mutant starts up - the lib/syslibs and lib/antlibs directories.
The distinction between these two locations is explained in the configuration
discussion below. All jars in these directories will be search for library
descriptors. All libraries providing descriptors will be available for
importing
into builds</p>
<p> In addition to the automatically loaded libraries, it is possible to
explicitly request additional libraries to be loaded using the
<code><loadlib></code> task. Individual libraries may be loaded or a set
of libraries loaded from a directory. Libraries may also be loaded from remote
locations by specifying a URL. The loadlib task can request that all
components
in the loaded library also be imported at the time of loading. Examples of the
loadlib task follow </p>
<source><![CDATA[
<!-- load a library from a specific file and import all components -->
<loadlib file="/opt/tools/toollib.jar" importall="true"/>
<!-- load all libraries from a directory -->
<loadlib dir="/opt/appserver/lib/"/>
<!-- load libraries from a remote server -->
<loadlib url="http://jakarta.apache.org/ant/testtasks.jar"/>
]]></source>
<p>
In general the loading of libraries from absolute locations would be a
configuration task. These would be specified in the Mutant configuration file
and would not be used in a build file. The loading of project libraries from
relative locations may be something that you would see in a build file.
</p>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Importing components">
<p>
Mutant is designed to allow tasks to be defined simply by dropping a jar in a
directory or configuring Mutant to look in particular places for jars. This
will
allow tasks and types developed by many different developers to be used. With
many developers developing tasks, however, inevitably some tasks will end up
with the same name.
</p>
<p>
This is very similar to the situation faced by Java with Java class names.
Many Java classes have the same name. When a Java programmer uses a class they
must import that class with an import statement. This tells the Java compiler
which particular class is being referenced by the classname. Effectively the
import statement creates a mapping from a name used in the Java source file
and
a class in the global package namespace.
</p>
<p>
Mutant provides an import task to specify, in a manner similar to Java's
import
statement, which components are being used. When a component is imported the
library is identified by its unique id. By default the component is imported
into the frame using the name it is known by within the library. When this
would
conflict with a name that has already been imported, the import task allows
the
component to be given a new name, or alias, by which it will be referenced. It
is also possible to import all the components in a library. The folowing
example
shows the various methods by which the import task can be used to import
components.
</p>
<source><![CDATA[
<!-- import the runtool task from the com.foo.tools library -->
<import libraryId="com.foo.tools" name="runtool"/>
<!-- import the runtool task from the com.bar.tools library and
alias it since the runtool is already defined -->
<import libraryId="com.bar.tools" name="runtool" alias="runbartool"/>
<!-- import all of the tasks from the com.fubar.tools library -->
<import libraryId="com.fubar.tools"/>
]]></source>
<p>
By using library identifiers, import operations are not tied to a particular
library location. The separation of the loading and importing into separate
phases allows environment-dependent locations to be specified as configuration
information and location independent importing to be specified in the build
file. This is similar to the case of Java imports. Java classes are imported
by
their global name without needing to known where the classfile is that
contains
that class. That information is provided externally in the CLASSPATH variable.
</p>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Library classpath management">
<p>
Many libraries will have dependencies on external jars. For example, a task
might make use of regular-expression libraries such as jakarta-regexp or a
task
may provide a wrapper around some external tool. In these cases the task will
usually need to have the required classes available in the classloader from
which the task itself was loaded. It is possible to avoid these direct
dependencies using techniques such as reflection and explicitly loading the
required classes through additional classloaders but the code is often harder
to
write and understand.
</p>
<p> It is not always possible or desirable to bundle the required classes in
the
task's jar nor is it desirable that the system classpath contains the required
classes. In fact it is often preferable to run Mutant with an empty classpath.
Buildfiles which do not assume that the system classpath contains particular
classes are generally more portable. Mutant provides a task,
<code><libpath></code>, to allow additional paths to be assodicated
with a
library. As with the loadlib task, the libpath task may be used to associate a
single file, all jars in a directory or remote jars with a library. </p>
<source><![CDATA[
<libpath libraryid="ant.ant1compat"
dir="/home/conor/jakarta-ant/lib/optional/"/>
]]></source>
<p> The above example associates all the jars in
/home/conor/jakarta-ant/lib/optional/ with the library whose unique id is
ant.ant1compat. A path must be associated with a library before any components
are imported from the library. Mutant associates the paths with the library
and
at the time a component is requested from the library, Mutant will form the
classloader that will be used. The additional paths are added to the
definition
of the classloader. Once a component is loaded, further paths will not have
any
effect. For this reason, and since the additonal paths are likely to be
absolute
paths, the <code><libpath></code> task is normally used in Mutant's
configuration phase. </p>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Automatic Imports">
<p>
Mutant will automatically import all components of any library whose unique
identifier begins with "ant." when the ;library is loaded. This is
mainly a convenience to provide a minimum set of tasks with which to construct
build files.
</p>
</subsection>
</section>
<section name="Includes">
<p>Mutant provides a mechanism for including build file fragments into a build
file. This following example illustrates how this works</p>
<source><![CDATA[
build.ant
==========
<project default="main" xmlns:ant="http://jakarta.apache.org/ant";>
<ant:include fragment="fragment.ant"/>
</project>
fragment.ant
============
<fragment>
<target name="main">
<echo message="main target"/>
</target>
</fragment>
]]></source>
<p> The include mechanism can be used to include a complete project file or as
shown in the example, a fragment. When including a project, any attributes on
the included <code><project></code> element are ignored and the contents
of the project inserted into the including project. In all cases the included
files must be a well formed XML file containing a root element. </p>
<box>
<p><font color="red">This area of Mutant is subject to change.</font></p>
<p>At present include elements are processed at parse-time. As such they can
only occur at the top-level of the build file. They cannot occur in a target.
The use of the namespace to qualify the include element is intended to convey
the fact that this is not part of the build structure.</p>
<p>An alternative approach would be to define include as a regular task. When
an
include is processed, the top-level tasks of the included project would be
executed immediately and the targets added to the current project
structure.</p>.
</box>
</section>
<section name="Project References">
<subsection name="Creating references">
<p>
Mutant allows build file writers to reference properties and targets in other
projects by creating a project reference. Project references are introduced
using the ref task.
</p>
<source><![CDATA[
<!-- create a reference to the main build -->
<ref project="main.xml" name="main"/>
<ref project="test.xml" name="test">
<property name=build.dir" value="build/test"/>
</ref>
]]></source>
<p>
The above example creates two project references - one to the build in
main.xml
and one to the build in test.xml. When a reference is created, it must be
given
a label. This label will be used to refer to items within the referenced
project (see below). Note that the ref task is a regular task and the
reference
is only created when the ref task is executed. A ref task may be placed at the
top level of a build to effectively create static references. Alternatively a
reference may be created dynamically by putting the ref task in a target.
</p>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Referencing project items">
<p>
The label given to a project reference is used when accessing items within the
project. So, to access the build.dir property in the project referenced by the
main label, you would use main:build.dir. Similarly the compile target would
be
referred to as main:compile. Since the referenced projects may also create
their
own project references, labels may be concatenated to access items at
arbitrary
depths. For example, if main.xml referenced another project under the label
"sub", a property debug could be referenced as main:sub:debug. The
following example shows various items in the referenced project being used.
</p>
<source><![CDATA[
<!-- Specify the build.dir in the main project prior to the reference
being created -->
<property name="main:build.dir" value="build/main"/>
<!-- create the reference to the main build -->
<ref project="main.xml" name="main"/>
<!-- create the reference to the test build -->
<ref project="test.xml" name="test">
<property name="build.dir" value="build/test"/>
</ref>
<!-- our main target calls the fubar target in the main build -->
<target name="main">
<antcall target="main:fubar"/>
</target>
<!-- Our alt target depends on the fubar target in the main build -->
<target name="alt" depends="main:fubar">
<echo message="main's debug flag is ${main:debug}"/>
</target>
]]></source>
<p>
When a project is referenced, the top level tasks of the referenced project
are
run to allow the project to initialize itself. Mutant allows the referring
build to set a property in a referenced project before the reference is
created. When the reference is eventually created these properties are set
before initialization occurs. In normal Ant fashion, these overriding
properties take precedence. In particular properties in the referenced
projects
may be set from the command line as this example shows
</p>
<source>
mutant -Dmain:build.dir=temp
</source>
<p>
The example above shows a target in the referenced project being used as a
dependency and also as a target in an antcall. Since refs are dynamic, Mutant
will only evaluate such dependencies when required. If the alt target were
never to be run, the dependency on main:fubar would never be checked.
</p>
<p>
The import task allows components defined in a referenced project to be
brought
into the main build. For example, the following will bring the definition of
tool from the test project in the build. The imported component may also be
aliased to a new name.
</p>
<source><![CDATA[
<!-- import a task definition from another project -->
<import ref="test:tool"/>
]]></source>
</subsection>
</section>
<section name="Configuration">
<p>
As discussed above Mutant provides a number of tasks to manage libraries and
it is appropriate to run many of these tasks as part of a user or system-wide
configuration rather than incorporating them into the build file. Mutant
provides a configuration system to support running these tasks at an
appropriate
time. A Mutant configuration file looks as follows
</p>
<source><![CDATA[
<antconfig allow-unset-properties="true">
<global-tasks>
<libpath libraryid="ant.ant1compat"
file="/home/conor/dev/jakarta-ant/lib/optional/"/>
</global-tasks>
<project-tasks>
<import libraryid="antopt.monitor"/>
</project-tasks>
</antconfig>
]]></source>
<p>
The antconfig element is the root element of the configuration file. It
supports
three attributes
</p>
<table>
<tr>
<td>allow-unset-properties</td>
<td>controls whether Mutant will fail a build which
refers to a property which has not been set. This defaults to the Ant1
behaviour
(true)</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>allow-remote-library</td>
<td>controls whether Mutant uses components defined in remote libraries</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>allow-remote-project</td>
<td>controls whether Mutant can run a project or reference a project which is
located remotely.</td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>
The configuration provides two collections of configuration tasks,
global-tasks
and project-tasks. Global-tasks are run once and are run in the context of the
main project - i.e. the build file identified on the command line (defaults to
build.xml/build.ant), whilst project-tasks are run as part of the
initialization
of every project including referenced projects and antcall projects. Looking
at
the above example, the global-tasks associate a path with the ant.ant1compat
library while the per-project tasks import the antopt.monitor library into
every
project that Mutant processes.
</p>
<p>
The tasks that can be run in the configuration phase are regular tasks but not
all tasks are automatically available. This is the difference between the
syslibs and antlibs directories. The global tasks are run after the syslibs
libraries have been loaded but prior to the antlibs libraries being loaded.
The
syslibs library tasks are therefore available in the configuration phase. This
arrangement is to allow the configuration tasks to setup library paths for the
libraries contained in the antlibs directory, especially libraries in the Ant
namespace which are automatically imported at the time they are loaded.
</p>
<p>
If it is required to use tasks from libraries installed in the antlibs
directory, the configuration tasks may explicitly load the library and import
the required tasks. The following example shows the loading and use of the
echo
task in the configuration tasks. Note that the ant.home property has been set
at
the time the configuration tasks are started.
</p>
<source><![CDATA[
<antconfig allow-unset-properties="true">
<global-tasks>
<loadlib file="${ant.home}/lib/antlibs/ant1compat.jar" importall="true"/>
<echo message="Starting the build"/>
</global-tasks>
<project-tasks>
<echo message="Starting new project"/>
</project-tasks>
</antconfig>
]]></source>
<p>
When Mutant starts up it will load configurations from two locations - The
file
.ant/conf/antconfig.xml in the user's home directory and the file
conf/antconfig.xml in the Mutant home directory. In addition, config files can
be specified on the command line using a -config argument. This allows project
specific configurations to be used.
</p>
</section>
<section name="Targetless builds">
<p>
Mutant allows any task or datatype to be placed outside of a target. All such
components are processed when the project is initialized and before any
targets
are processed. In fact Mutant does not require that a project contain any
targets. In this case the only operations performed are the top level tasks at
project initialization. The following shows a simple example
</p>
<source><![CDATA[
<project>
<echo message="Welcome to Mutant"/>
</project>
]]></source>
</section>
<section name="Extensibility">
<p>
Normally when a task supports a nested element, Ant automatically determines
the
type of the nested element and creates an instance of this type. This
instance is
then configured and passed to the task. Mutant extends this scheme by allowing
a build file writer to specify the type of nested element to use rather than
relying on the core to determine it. Mutant will process attributes and
further
nested elements based on the specified type. For example:
</p>
<source><![CDATA[
<copy todir="dest">
<fileset xsi:type="classfileset" dir="../../bin/ant1compat/">
<root classname="org.apache.tools.ant.Project"/>
</fileset>
</copy>
]]></source>
<p>
In this example the nested element is actually a classfileset which supports
the
<root> nested element. The actual type is specified using the notation
from
XML Schema. Mutant predclares the XML Schema namespace under the xsi prefix.
You
may explicitly declare this in the build file's XML and use a different prefix
if you wish. For example, this is equivalent to the above
</p>
<source><![CDATA[
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<project xmlns:schema="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance";
name="test" default="main">
<target name="main">
<delete dir="dest"/>
<mkdir dir="dest"/>
<copy todir="dest">
<fileset schema:type="classfileset" dir="../../bin/ant1compat/">
<root classname="org.apache.tools.ant.Project"/>
</fileset>
</copy>
</target>
</project>
]]></source>
</section>
<section name="Default build file">
<p>In Ant1, the default build file name is build.xml. In Mutant, the default
build file is build.ant. If build.xnt cannot be found, Mutant will then look
for
build.xml. This allows you to support both Ant1 and Ant2 users. The build.xml
file can contain an Ant1 build file. The build.ant file can include or
reference
this build and make use of Mutant's capabilities such as library management,
library path settings, etc.
</p>
</section>
</body>
</document>
1.1 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/xdocs/goals.xml
Index: goals.xml
===================================================================
<document>
<properties>
<author email="">Conor MacNeill</author>
<title>Mutant Goals</title>
</properties>
<body>
<section name="Goals">
<p>
This page describes the key goals that have shaped the development of
Mutant.
</p>
<p>
The first section identifies a set of issues with Ant1 that have cropped up as
Ant1 has evolved. The design implications of each issue are then summarized
as a
Mutant requirement. I do not want to suggest that these problems are
unsolvable
within the Ant1 design. Already I believe we have seen the Ant2 proposals
influencing people trying to extend Ant1. These issues may be solvable,
although at
the risk of backward compatability impacts or further complication of the Ant1
codebase.
</p>
<p>
The second section covers a set of additional requirements that have emerged
as
the whole concept of Ant2 has developed. Many of these came from the
discussions
on the Ant-Dev mailing list.
</p>
<p>
The realisation of these requirements as they impact a user is on the
<a href="features.html">next page</a>. Th implications for task developers and
Ant developers are discussed in the following sections.
</p>
</section>
<section name="Ant1 Issues">
<subsection name="Unrestricted core access">
<p>
The interface between the Ant core and tasks is not controlled. It
allows tasks almost complete access to the internal data structures of the
core. This is poor encapsulation. Whilst most tasks do not need and do not
use this access, its existence nonetheless prevents changes being made to
the core without raising concerns about impacting backward compatability.
</p>
<p>
The uncontrolled nature of the task-core interface also makes it difficult
to reuse tasks and types in a different context without almost completely
duplicating the Ant core
</p>
<box>
<p>
A tightly defined interface between the core and the components (tasks and
types) will allow the core implementation to be changed without the risk
of impacting tasks. It will also allow components to be reused in other
contexts.
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Lack of embedding support">
<p>
Ant1 does not provide strong support for embedding Ant in other systems,
particularly a GUI or IDE. The development of Antidote highlighted this
difficultly. Antidote was forced to perform its own XML parsing so it could
build its own model of the build. There is no communication medium for a GUI
to
communicate with the core. Without this capability any GUI will be limited to
simply editing the XML representation of the build.
</p>
<box>
<p>
The definition of a project model, a Java-based object-model of a build
description would decouple Ant from the XML representation. This allows
other representations to be used. Such an object model also forms the basis
for communications between systems which want to embed Ant. An IDE could
manipulate this project object model directly and pass to the core for
processing without needing to convert to and from an external
representations such as XML.
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Configuration done at Parse-Time">
<p>
The original implementation of Ant1 performed all task configuration at the
time the XML description of the build was parsed (parse-time). This approach
could not handle dynamically created tasks very well since in some
instances the type of the task to be configured was not known at parse-time.
This limitation was overcome with the introduction of the UnknownElement and
RuntimeConfigurable classes. While these work well, they are confusing and at
times surprising to most Ant developers. Also some operations still occur at
parse-time, notably creation of nested elements of known types. This could be
overcome by going to a fully dynamic model but the fear of backward
incompatability constrains this change from occuring.
</p>
<box>
<p>
Execution-time configuration of tasks allows for the latest information to be
used for configuration. It is also necessary to support the concept of the
project model. The project model cannot contain execution-time information as
it
does in Ant1
</p>
<p>
The decoupling of the parsing and exection phases, communicating through the
medium of the project model will allow the core to be modularized. The parsing
and execution phases can be separated and one replaced without impacting the
other.
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Multiple execution">
<p>
In Ant1, a task, once configured, may be used more than once - i.e. its
execute method may be called more than once. This occurs when the Ant
command line specifies the evaluation of two targets. If those targets have
overlapping dependencies, the tasks in those overlapping dependencies will
be executed twice. This arrangement requires task writers to preserve the
state configured by Ant during the execution of the task so that the next
execution has the correct configuration.
</p>
<p>
Many task writers are not aware of this requirement. Frequently the task's
state is changed during the execution method, which can lead to mysterious
falures during subsequent executions. This need to preserve the configuration
state makes writing tasks much harder.
</p>
<box>
<p>
Once a task is configured, it should be executed once. If the execution of
multiple targets is required, a new task instance should be created and
configured from the same project model. If reuse of task instances is desired
each instance must be reinitialized and reconfigured before use.
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
<subsection name="No automatic deployment of tasks">
<p>
Ant1 has a set of well-known tasks (and types). A well-known task is one
for which a mapping between the taskname and its implementing class is
predefined in Ant. This mapping is provided by the two defaults.properties
files in Ant's code. These well-known tasks do not need to be taskdef'd to
make them available in a build file. Conversely tasks which are not in this
list need to be explicitly taskdef'd.
</p>
<p>
Note that this distinction is not the same as the core/optional
distinction found in Ant1. An Ant1 core task is notionally supported by Ant
without requiring any additional external libraries - it just requires the
classes available in the 1.1 JDK, in Ant and in the libraries Ant uses such
as the XML parser. An optional task is a task which requires JDK 1.2+
features or the support of an external library, such as jakarta-regexp.
</p>
<p>
The problem with this system is that there is no namespace management. If a
new task is added to Ant, it may invalidate buildfiles which are already
using that taskname via a taskdef. Actually the taskdef may continue to work
or
it may not - it will depend on the nested elements that the task definitions
support (see above discussion of regarding cofiguration at parse-time)
</p>
<box>
<p>
Tasks need to be deployed in libraries by either placing them in well known
directories of an Ant install or by telling Ant where to look for them.
Removing
the central management of defined task names allows tasks libraries to be
developed and maintained independently of Ant much more easily.
</p>
<p>
Once centralised management of the task namespace is removed, there is,
however, the possibility of name collision. A mechanism is required to allow a
build file writer to select which particular tasks are assigned to which
tasknames.
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Top level tasks">
<p>
In Ant1 certain tasks may appear outside of any target. This is implemented
as a
set of hardcoded conditions in the XML parsing phase. The execution and
configuration of these tasks does not involve the use of RuntimeConfigurable
and
UnknownElement.
</p>
<p>
This hardcoding is not very inituitive. It is confusing to users who do not
know why only some tasks may be run outside of a target. Also as the list of
tasks that may be useful as a top-level task grows, further special cases must
be added to the code making the code harder to maintain.
</p>
<box>
<p>
The number of special names should be kept to a minimum. Special cases should
be avoided as they are not inituitive.
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Build file inclusion is cumbersome">
<p>
In Ant1, the inclusion of a set of build file definitions or targets is
achieved
through the use of XML entities. This is just cumbersome.
</p>
<box>
<p>
A simplified include mechanism is required to replace the entity based
inclusion of Ant1.
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Classpath management">
<p>
Probably the greatest issue facing Ant1 today involves the management of the
classpath and the associated visibility of classes. Most optional tasks in
Ant1
require the supporting classes for the task to be available on the system
classpath. For example, the JUnit task is only usable if the JUnit jar is on
the classpath. If it is not, Ant will complain about being unable to create
the
junit task.
</p>
<p>
The usual solution when a user runs into this problem is to put the required
jar
into the ANT_HOME/lib directory. This just adds the required jar to the system
classpath prior to starting Ant albeit without requiring the user to
explicitly
set the classpath.
</p>
<p>
There are a number of issues with this approach. The classes on the
classpath share the same classloader as Ant's classes and Ant's support
libraries - particularly the XML parser. If a task wishes to use a specific
XML
parser, it may conflict with Ant's own parser. If two tasks require different
versions of a supporting jar, these will conflict.
</p>
<p>
Many tasks make use of factory objects (dynamic class instantiation, dynamic
resource loading, etc). When the factory is in the system classpath it will
not
be able to load resources available in a taskdef'd task's custom classpath due
to the delegating nature of classloaders. Such errors can be very confusing to
users. More recent code is likely to attempt use of a context classloader but
this is not set by Ant1 currently.
</p>
<box>
<p>
Do not require jars to be added to ANT_HOME/lib to enable tasks. Allow users
to
specify the location of support jars on a per-library basis.
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Extensibility">
<p>
The earliest versions Ant1 did not explicitly support any datatypes. The only
datatype, property, was actually created as a side-effect of running the
<code><property></code> task. If it were to be implemented today,
property
would probably be known as a string datatype, perhaps associated with a
<code><load-properties></code> task. This is also the reason property
is one of those tasks which is allowed to exist outside of a target.
</p>
<p> As Ant1 evolved new types such as <code><path></code> and
<code><fileset></code> were added. The concept of datatypes has
continued
to evolve to the point where users can now define new datatypes. It would be
expected that in addition to new types there will be many sub-types created,
such as new types of fileset. Ant1, however, does not strongly support such
type
extensibility. When a subtype is created by extending an existing type, Ant1
requires it to be either used by reference or all tasks which accept the base
type need to be modified to support the new type. Use by reference is not
always
possible. It will depend on whether the base type has been coded to support
references. </p>
<box>
<p>
Support polymorphic behaviour, allowing a build file to pass a subtype to a
task which is defined to accept the base type. Allow task interfaces to be
defined in terms of interfaces.
</p>
<p>
Move reference processing to the core to make it more regular removing the
burden of type developers to explicitly support references.
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Project object does too much">
<p>
In Ant1 the Project object takes on too many roles including all of the
following:
</p>
<ul>
<li>Holds the project model built when parsing the build file</li>
<li>Holds the run-time state of the build through the properties and current
task definitions</li>
<li>Provides context for task execution. All tasks have a reference to their
project instance and use it to access core functions</li>
<li>Provides the implementation of common task operations</li>
<li>Build event management</li>
<li>Message logging</li>
<li>Global filter definitions</li>
<li>Java Version</li>
<li>Property replacement</li>
<li>Message Levels</li>
<li>Utility functions such as boolean conversion and path translation</li>
<li>Integration point for embedding Ant</li>
</ul>
<p> As a class, Project is not cohesive. Reuse of the Ant core functionality
is
difficulty as all of these concerns bring in many other support classes.
</p>
<box>
<p>
Separate the various roles of Project into more cohesive classes.
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
</section>
<section name="Other Goals">
<p>
In addition to the issues which arise from Ant1 limitations, there are a
number
of requirements which have emerged in the mailing list discussions about Ant2.
This isn't a complete list - just the ones I picked up for Mutant.
</p>
<subsection name="Limited project reuse">
<p> In Ant1 the only way to reuse build file definitions is to use the
<code><ant></code> task. While useful, it is relatively coarse-grained.
It
can also be tedious if you are trying to extend an existing project
definition -
that is, adding new targets while retaining a user's ability to access the
existing targets. </p>
<p>
In addition to the extension of projects, it should be possible to compose
projects creating dependencies between the targets of the different projects,
and to access the data and definitions of one project by a controlling project
</p>
<box>
<p>
Allow a project to extend and control other projects
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Ant1 Compatibility - Zero Friction">
<p>
While it has always been accepted that there will be come backward
compatibility
breaks in moving from Ant1 to Ant2, these should be minimized. If the
changeover
from Ant1 to Ant2 is difficult, it may never happen. On the other hand, the
openness of the Ant1 interface means that some tasks will not work as
expected -
the most difficult being the <code><script></code> task.
</p>
<box>
<p>
Achieve a practical level of compatability without degrading the integrity of
the core's interfaces. A practical level of compatability is intentionally a
vague measure but it would require the majority of projects in Gump to be
built
without noticeable differences from Ant1
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
<subsection name="XML Configuration">
<p>
In Ant1 configuration of Ant is achieved either through the execution of OS
dependent scripts by the launcher scripts or though properties files which
have
the limited capability to set properties.
</p>
<box>
<p>
Provide an XML based configuration system with rich capabilities to configure
the operation of Ant.
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
<subsection name="Aspects">
<p>
In Ant1 there are many things which are common to a group of tasks but adding
the capability to each task is repetitive and tedious. An example would be the
failonerror attribute which controls whether a task will cause the build to
stop
when it fails. This started on just one task but has since been added to many
other tasks as users want more fine control over when their builds stop.
Aspects
have been discussed as a mechanism for providing a single implementation of a
concept or control that can then be applied to tasks independently.
</p>
<box>
<p>
Investigate the use of an Aspect approach to provide common functionality
across tasks with a single implementation
</p>
</box>
</subsection>
</section>
</body>
</document>
1.1 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/xdocs/index.xml
Index: index.xml
===================================================================
<document>
<properties>
<author email="">Conor MacNeill</author>
<title>Mutant Introduction</title>
</properties>
<body>
<section name="Introduction">
<p>
These pages describe the design and implementation of Mutant.
</p>
<p>
For some time, there has been the concept of Ant 2.0, a rearchitecting of
Ant designed to address the shortcomings in the design of Ant 1.x, while
drawing the experience gained in that development. This rearchitecting
would most likely be accompanied by at least some break in backward
compatability. Over time Ant 2.0 has come to be known as Ant2 and the current
Ant codebase is generally known as Ant1.
</p>
<p>
Mutant is my proposal, a revolution, for Ant2. Actually, I consider it more
an evolution of the design and implementation used for Ant1, but in Jakarta
parlance, being a separate codebase, it is termed a revolution.
</p>
<p>
There is no special significance in the name Mutant. I chose it because, as
a word, it is an extension of the word Ant and it also signifies a change
from the previous generation
</p>
</section>
<section name="Other Proposals">
<p>
Mutant is not the only proposed revolution for Ant2. Peter Donald has
developed another known as
<a href="http://jakarta.apache.org/ant/myrmidon";>Myrmidon</a>
which presents a different view of how Ant2 could be realized. Other
people hold the view that Ant1 can continue to evolve and that there
is no need for rearchitecture of its codebase. I recommend you
investigate all these points of view.
</p>
<p>
As I write this, no decision has been taken as to which codebase will be
adopted for Ant2. It may not be Mutant and it could even be some entirely
new proposal. These pages do not compare and contrast Mutant with these
other proposals or points of view, at least not explicitly. They are just
intended to describe how Mutant is designed and implemented and why it is the
way it is.
</p>
</section>
<section name="Getting Started">
<box>
<h1><font color="red">Caution</font></h1>
<p>
Mutant is not even an alpha release. While it is relatively stable, it is
subject to change. There are no backward compatability guarantees for any of
the classes, interfaces, build files, configuration, launch scripts, etc that
Mutant provides.
</p>
<p>In particular, some features in Mutant are experimental and may not, in the
long run, prove to be worthwhile.</p>
</box>
<p>
<a href="goals.html">Start</a> now by looking at the key requirements which
have
shaped the design of Mutant.
</p>
<div align="right">
<p>Conor MacNeill</p>
</div>
</section>
</body>
</document>
1.2 +15 -42 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/xdocs/stylesheets/project.xml
Index: project.xml
===================================================================
RCS file:
/home/cvs/jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/xdocs/stylesheets/project.xml,v
retrieving revision 1.1
retrieving revision 1.2
diff -u -w -u -r1.1 -r1.2
--- project.xml 24 Jan 2002 12:51:57 -0000 1.1
+++ project.xml 19 Jun 2002 12:34:58 -0000 1.2
@@ -1,50 +1,23 @@
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
-<project name="Jakarta Site"
- href="http://jakarta.apache.org/";>
+<project name="Mutant Proposal" href="http://jakarta.apache.org/ant/mutant";>
- <title>The Jakarta Site</title>
+ <title>Mutant Proposal</title>
<!-- uncomment and put your project logo here!
<logo href="http://jakarta.apache.org/images/jakarta-logo.gif";>The
Jakarta Project</logo>
-->
<body>
- <menu name="Apache Ant">
- <item name="Front Page"
+ <menu name="Mutant Proposal">
+ <item name="Introduction"
href="/index.html"/>
- <item name="News"
- href="/antnews.html"/>
- <item name="Documentation"
- href="/manual/index.html"/>
- <item name="External Tools and Tasks"
- href="/external.html"/>
- <item name="Resources"
- href="/resources.html"/>
- <item name="Ant FAQ"
- href="/faq.html"/>
- <item name="Having Problems?"
- href="/problems.html"/>
+ <item name="Design Goals"
+ href="/goals.html"/>
+ <item name="User Features"
+ href="/features.html"/>
+ <item name="Task Developers"
+ href="/developers.html"/>
+ <item name="Design Description"
+ href="/design.html"/>
</menu>
-
- <menu name="Download">
- <item name="Binaries" href="/site/binindex.html"/>
- <item name="Source Code" href="/site/sourceindex.html"/>
- </menu>
-
- <menu name="Jakarta">
- <item name="News & Status" href="/site/news.html"/>
- <item name="Mission" href="/site/mission.html"/>
- <item name="Guidelines Notes" href="/site/guidelines.html"/>
- <item name="FAQs" href="/site/faqs.html"/>
- </menu>
-
- <menu name="Get Involved">
- <item name="Overview" href="/site/getinvolved.html"/>
- <item name="CVS Repositories" href="/site/cvsindex.html"/>
- <item name="Mailing Lists" href="/site/mail.html"/>
- <item name="Reference Library" href="/site/library.html"/>
- <item name="Bug Database"
href="http://nagoya.apache.org/bugzilla/enter_bug.cgi?product=Ant"/>
- <item name="Enhancement Requests"
href="http://nagoya.apache.org/bugzilla/enter_bug.cgi?product=Ant&bug_severity=Enhancement"/>
- </menu>
-
</body>
</project>
1.2 +5 -1 jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/xdocs/stylesheets/site.vsl
Index: site.vsl
===================================================================
RCS file: /home/cvs/jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/xdocs/stylesheets/site.vsl,v
retrieving revision 1.1
retrieving revision 1.2
diff -u -w -u -r1.1 -r1.2
--- site.vsl 24 Jan 2002 12:51:57 -0000 1.1
+++ site.vsl 19 Jun 2002 12:34:59 -0000 1.2
@@ -35,6 +35,8 @@
#source ($items)
#elseif ($items.getName().equals("table"))
#table ($items)
+ #elseif ($items.getName().equals("box"))
+ #box ($items)
#else
$xmlout.outputString($items)
#end
@@ -62,6 +64,8 @@
#table ($items)
#elseif ($items.getName().equals("subsection"))
#subsection ($items)
+ #elseif ($items.getName().equals("box"))
+ #box ($items)
#else
$xmlout.outputString($items)
#end
1.2 +37 -9
jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/xdocs/stylesheets/templates.vm
Index: templates.vm
===================================================================
RCS file:
/home/cvs/jakarta-ant/proposal/mutant/xdocs/stylesheets/templates.vm,v
retrieving revision 1.1
retrieving revision 1.2
diff -u -w -u -r1.1 -r1.2
--- templates.vm 24 Jan 2002 12:51:57 -0000 1.1
+++ templates.vm 19 Jun 2002 12:34:59 -0000 1.2
@@ -111,6 +111,34 @@
</div>
#end
+#macro ( box $value)
+ <div align="left">
+ <table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0">
+ <tr>
+ <td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
+ <td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
+ <td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
+ </tr>
+ <tr>
+ <td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
+ <td bgcolor="#ffffff">
+ #if ($value.getText().length() != 0 || $value.hasChildren())
+ $xmlout.outputString($value, true)
+ #else
+
+ #end
+ </td>
+ <td bgcolor="#023264" width="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
+ </tr>
+ <tr>
+ <td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
+ <td bgcolor="#023264" height="1"><img src="/images/void.gif"
width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0" border="0"/></td>
+ <td bgcolor="#023264" width="1" height="1"><img
src="/images/void.gif" width="1" height="1" vspace="0" hspace="0"
border="0"/></td>
+ </tr>
+ </table>
+ </div>
+#end
+
#macro ( makeProject )
#set ($menus = $project.getChild("body").getChildren("menu"))
#foreach ( $menu in $menus )
@@ -187,7 +215,7 @@
</td></tr>
<tr><td colspan="2">
<div align="center"><font color="$bodylink" size="-1"><em>
- Copyright © 2000-2002, Apache Software Foundation
+ Copyright © 2002, Apache Software Foundation
</em></font></div>
</td></tr>
</table>
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![http://jakarta.apache.org/images/jakarta-logo.gif"](http://jakarta.apache.org/images/jakarta-logo.gif"){kind=link}