Request - Native Java Script Support
Dear Ant-Team, I am an avid Ant user since more than 10 years back and I'm happy to see how it has progressed! Recently I have begun writing very complex build scripts and found myself craving for a more programmatic solution which using Ant in standard configurations means using JavaScript or writing extensions. In addition, I have also been using .NET tools like NAnt. In NAnt there is no JavaScript support but there is support for native C#. I find C# and Java much better for this purpose than JavaScript so my question is really: Would it be completely unthinkable to add Java as a scripting language? Since Ant already presumes JDK it doesn't sound completely undoable either. Beanshell isn't an active project and I don't see any advantage with Beanshell compared to native Java. Sincerely, Anders Rundgren - To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@ant.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@ant.apache.org
Re: Request - Native Java Script Support
Hi Anders, Have you tried groovy script? I think groovy is completely compatible with java. That is any valid java code is valid groovy code too. From: Anders Rundgren anders.rundg...@telia.com To: dev@ant.apache.org Sent: Thursday, September 20, 2012 3:11 AM Subject: Request - Native Java Script Support Dear Ant-Team, I am an avid Ant user since more than 10 years back and I'm happy to see how it has progressed! Recently I have begun writing very complex build scripts and found myself craving for a more programmatic solution which using Ant in standard configurations means using JavaScript or writing extensions. In addition, I have also been using .NET tools like NAnt. In NAnt there is no JavaScript support but there is support for native C#. I find C# and Java much better for this purpose than JavaScript so my question is really: Would it be completely unthinkable to add Java as a scripting language? Since Ant already presumes JDK it doesn't sound completely undoable either. Beanshell isn't an active project and I don't see any advantage with Beanshell compared to native Java. Sincerely, Anders Rundgren - To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@ant.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@ant.apache.org
Re: Request - Native Java Script Support
On 2012-09-20 13:21, Vimil Saju wrote: Hi Anders, Have you tried groovy script? I think groovy is completely compatible with java. That is any valid java code is valid groovy code too. Hi Vimil, I guess you refer to: http://groovy.codehaus.org ? I haven't tried with Groovy script and my request is really about getting a core feature already verified being useful in NAnt into the default Ant installation so you can ship build scripts to anybody (having an upgraded Ant NB...) without requiring yet another install. It is quite possible that I'm wrong but it seems that this would something like the javac and java targets combined so 90% of the code should already be in place sort of :-) IMO such a feature could extend the life of Ant considerably. Nobody can beat the power of a full-blown programming language! Regards, Anders From: Anders Rundgren anders.rundg...@telia.com To: dev@ant.apache.org Sent: Thursday, September 20, 2012 3:11 AM Subject: Request - Native Java Script Support Dear Ant-Team, I am an avid Ant user since more than 10 years back and I'm happy to see how it has progressed! Recently I have begun writing very complex build scripts and found myself craving for a more programmatic solution which using Ant in standard configurations means using JavaScript or writing extensions. In addition, I have also been using .NET tools like NAnt. In NAnt there is no JavaScript support but there is support for native C#. I find C# and Java much better for this purpose than JavaScript so my question is really: Would it be completely unthinkable to add Java as a scripting language? Since Ant already presumes JDK it doesn't sound completely undoable either. Beanshell isn't an active project and I don't see any advantage with Beanshell compared to native Java. Sincerely, Anders Rundgren - To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@ant.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@ant.apache.org - To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@ant.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@ant.apache.org
Re: Request - Native Java Script Support
Anders Rundgren anders.rundg...@telia.com wrote on 09/20/2012 07:55:13 AM: I haven't tried with Groovy script and my request is really about getting a core feature already verified being useful in NAnt into the default Ant installation so you can ship build scripts to anybody (having an upgraded Ant NB...) without requiring yet another install. It is quite possible that I'm wrong but it seems that this would something like the javac and java targets combined so 90% of the code should already be in place sort of :-) IMO such a feature could extend the life of Ant considerably. Nobody can beat the power of a full-blown programming language! Why not just write a custom task?
Re: Request - Native Java Script Support
On 2012-09-20 15:11, Jeffrey E Care wrote: Anders Rundgren anders.rundg...@telia.com wrote on 09/20/2012 07:55:13 AM: I haven't tried with Groovy script and my request is really about getting a core feature already verified being useful in NAnt into the default Ant installation so you can ship build scripts to anybody (having an upgraded Ant NB...) without requiring yet another install. It is quite possible that I'm wrong but it seems that this would something like the javac and java targets combined so 90% of the code should already be in place sort of :-) IMO such a feature could extend the life of Ant considerably. Nobody can beat the power of a full-blown programming language! Why not just write a custom task? Jeffrey, I guess I knew that this idea wouldn't get a big hooray... If you had tried NAnt you would probably agree that in-line Java is cooler than custom tasks because you (can) have the entire script in one file. The proposal wasn't to satisfy my own needs but to serve a large base of Ant users who are considering jumping the ship for Maven and other tools. Oh well. Anders - To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@ant.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@ant.apache.org
Re: Request - Native Java Script Support
Anders Rundgren anders.rundg...@telia.com wrote on 09/20/2012 09:27:10 AM: I guess I knew that this idea wouldn't get a big hooray... If you had tried NAnt you would probably agree that in-line Java is cooler than custom tasks because you (can) have the entire script in one file. The proposal wasn't to satisfy my own needs but to serve a large base of Ant users who are considering jumping the ship for Maven and other tools. I doubt I would agree. In my experience anything sufficiently complicated that it can't be handled by the standard tasks is going to require non-trivial custom code. No matter what technology I'm using to implement that custom code (e.g. javascript, java, groovy) I'm not going to want to clutter up my build.xml with it. I'm going to want to use my regular development tools to write that code. Having operated in both the Ant Maven worlds my answer is the same: if I need to do something custom in Ant I'm going to want to write a full-fledged custom task instead of trying to inline it in my build.xml; if I need to do something custom in Maven I'm going to want to write a full-fledged mojo instead of trying to inline it in my POM.
Re: Request - Native Java Script Support
Some years ago Stefan Bodewig and Jan Materne worked on this: http://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/ant/sandbox/javafront/ YMMV Matt On Thu, Sep 20, 2012 at 11:45 AM, Jeffrey E Care ca...@us.ibm.com wrote: Anders Rundgren anders.rundg...@telia.com wrote on 09/20/2012 09:27:10 AM: I guess I knew that this idea wouldn't get a big hooray... If you had tried NAnt you would probably agree that in-line Java is cooler than custom tasks because you (can) have the entire script in one file. The proposal wasn't to satisfy my own needs but to serve a large base of Ant users who are considering jumping the ship for Maven and other tools. I doubt I would agree. In my experience anything sufficiently complicated that it can't be handled by the standard tasks is going to require non-trivial custom code. No matter what technology I'm using to implement that custom code (e.g. javascript, java, groovy) I'm not going to want to clutter up my build.xml with it. I'm going to want to use my regular development tools to write that code. Having operated in both the Ant Maven worlds my answer is the same: if I need to do something custom in Ant I'm going to want to write a full-fledged custom task instead of trying to inline it in my build.xml; if I need to do something custom in Maven I'm going to want to write a full-fledged mojo instead of trying to inline it in my POM. - To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@ant.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@ant.apache.org
Re: Request - Native Java Script Support
On 2012-09-20 18:45, Jeffrey E Care wrote: Anders Rundgren anders.rundg...@telia.com wrote on 09/20/2012 09:27:10 AM: I guess I knew that this idea wouldn't get a big hooray... If you had tried NAnt you would probably agree that in-line Java is cooler than custom tasks because you (can) have the entire script in one file. The proposal wasn't to satisfy my own needs but to serve a large base of Ant users who are considering jumping the ship for Maven and other tools. I doubt I would agree. In my experience anything sufficiently complicated that it can't be handled by the standard tasks is going to require non-trivial custom code. No matter what technology I'm using to implement that custom code (e.g. javascript, java, groovy) I'm not going to want to clutter up my build.xml with it. I'm going to want to use my regular development tools to write that code. Having operated in both the Ant Maven worlds my answer is the same: if I need to do something custom in Ant I'm going to want to write a full-fledged custom task instead of trying to inline it in my build.xml; if I need to do something custom in Maven I'm going to want to write a full-fledged mojo instead of trying to inline it in my POM. We all do our choices. The request was simply about extending the range of those :-) Anders - To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@ant.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@ant.apache.org
