>From: "Ian MacLean" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Sent: Thursday, August 12, 2004 6:40 AM
> Actually I don't see how adding property files is any different from > using the <include> task to import properties. And I don't see how it There are a number of ways that the property mechanism in Ant is different from NAnt. The most obvious is that the property file syntax is much simpler. This may not seem like much, but not only does it make it easier to read the property file, it also guarantees that the property file isn't doing anything funky behind your back. More functionally, in NAnt, include files can only be included at the top level. This means you can't have a target decided which of several property files to load. There are probably ways to work around this in NAnt, but that's just another complexity. Related to property files, there are property sets. This makes it easier to treat properties as a group. The combination of property sets and property files makes it easy to pass different sets of properties to subtasks. Also, in Ant properties are always immutable (i.e. readonly). The evaluation order is well defined and the confusion over the property's value at any given time is reduced.. The way this affects the issue of properties on the command line is to encourage a simple consistent architecture. Instead of providing a number of properties on the command line, or having to remember the exact names and values for them, all the user really needs to do is to remember a set of file or directory names. This could be done in simple NAnt files using <include>, but as pointed out above, that's not as flexible. Either way, by relying heavily on property files, command line typos are found earlier (i.e. when the attempt to load the property file fails, rather than when a specific property is used). Gary ------------------------------------------------------- SF.Net email is sponsored by Shop4tech.com-Lowest price on Blank Media 100pk Sonic DVD-R 4x for only $29 -100pk Sonic DVD+R for only $33 Save 50% off Retail on Ink & Toner - Free Shipping and Free Gift. http://www.shop4tech.com/z/Inkjet_Cartridges/9_108_r285 _______________________________________________ Nant-users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-users
