On 12/6/05, Bryan Pendleton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Somewhat of a tangent, but could you take a few moments and explain > the intent behind having both "clobber" and "clean"? I don't understand > why it isn't sufficient just to have "ant clean". When are we supposed > to use "clean" versus "clobber"?
"clean" removes the contents of the build output directory only. Running the clean target is useful if you know you don't need to regenerate the sanity state or the parser files but you want a full recompile. "clobber" also removes generated files outside of the build output directory like the sanity state properties, the parser files generated by javacc and the class size catalog. It seems to me that the jars, being generated files and living outside the build output directory, would be a logical candidate for addition to the clobber target. Personally, I almost always clobber and almost never clean. Although, with the jars and javadoc added to clobber, I would probably use the clean target more often, as sometimes I don't want to blow away the jars or javadoc when doing a full recompile. Also, one could argue that the generated files like the parser files should move to the clean target to more reflect the general use of that target name, and having clobber take care of the higher-level build output like jars, javadoc, etc. andrew
