Well, one thing we all need to take into account is that, realistically, the
ANT distribution cannot ship every task that people write out there. Without
going into the issue of wheather your task is worth enough or not, let me say
that the ANT website provides the means for you to publicize your task and made
it available to people.
There is an external resouces page in ANT where you can advertise your tasks
and put a link to where to download it from. Of course, that means you keep the
responsability of maintaining your task, instead of dumping it on the larger
ANT community.
I think though, that we need to move away from shipping every task in the world
and instead stress this libraries to be provided by others. That should be the
normal mechanism for contributions.
Jose Alberto
----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Inger" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Ant Development" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Friday, September 21, 2001 8:26 PM
Subject: Re: [PATCH] PropertyCopy and Foreach (NEW OPTIONAL TASKS)
> I can understand them not wanting that kind of stuff as part
> of the core of ant. But to be so blind as to not even open
> the possibility of including it as part of the optional tasks
> is silly, from my point of view. They have tasks in there
> which would seem should be no where near the core of the
> system (ie. the sql tasks), but they refuse to accept tasks
> that users have requested time and time again. It's a bit
> frustrating. I put all this time and effort into developing
> these tasks with generality in mind. I personally am rather
> annoyed that even though i have tried repeatedly, it seems
> impossible to contribute to the project.
>
> I remember a time when software was driven by requirements,
> and more specifically languages/tools were driven the needs
> of it's users. It seems that ANT is a whole different animal
> that is not driven by the needs of the user, but by a vision
> of what it's committer's think it should be. Frankly, i can't
> understand why it is this way, but as of now there is nothing
> i can do about it. It is obvious that the users need more of
> these types of tasks to be able to effectively achieve their
> goals. And not all users have the time/knowledge to create
> their own tasks.
>
> I would think it would be in the best interests of the project
> and it's users to accept useful tasks from anyone who is willing
> to contribute. The only tasks I've seen them accept in the time
> i've been using ant are those related to version control and
> ejb.
>
> Thanks for hearing my frustrations.
>
>
> On Fri, 2001-09-21 at 14:20, Alejandro Abdelnur wrote:
> > matthew,
> >
> > i've been there already, submitted code doing that, it has been rejected.
> >
> > it is not the first time, or second time, that these features are proposed.
> > i
> > think the the folks driving the evolution of ant should start considering
> > these features again, they should listen a little more of what
> > developers/user
> > want/need.
> >
> > fyi:
> >
> > for embedded properties i modified the project helper, so you can use
> > embedded
> > variables "a.${b}.c" everywhere.
> >
> > for looping i've implemented the "xantcall" target, extending the "antcall"
> > target that supports iterations:
> >
> > <xantcall target="TARGET" iterate="LIST" iterator="VAR"/>
> >
> > where VAR is the name of the variable taht will have the element of the
> > current iteration.
> >
> > you can find the code in the archives.
> >
> > regards.
> >
> > a
> >
> > Matthew Inger wrote:
> >
> > > attached are two useful tasks i have written, that would
> > > be helpful to be put into the next release:
> > >
> > > PropertyCopy - double dereferencing (ie. ${a.${b}.c})
> > >
> > > this essentially takes the "from" attribute and treats
> > > it as a property name. It gets the value of that property
> > > and puts it in the property given by the "name" attribute.
> > > It's useful when you have property names that follow a certain
> > > pattern with some identifier in it (ie. org.TEST.server)
> > >
> > > ex. <propertycopy name="NewVar" from="a.${b}.c" />
> > >
> > > Foreach - relatively self explanatory
> > >
> > > ex. <foreach list="${items}" target="callMe"
> > > param="item" delimiter="," />
> > >
> > > I'm sure there are foreach tasks floating around, but
> > > while i'm posting propertycopy i might as well post
> > > the foreach task as well.
> > >
> > > --
> > > Matt Inger ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
> > > Sedona Corporation
> > > 455 S. Gulph Road, Suite 300
> > > King of Prussia, PA 19406
> > > (484) 679-2213
> > > "Self-respect - the secure feeling that no one,
> > > as yet, is suspicious." -H.L. Mencken
> > >
> > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > > Name: PropertyCopy.java
> > > PropertyCopy.java Type: text/x-java
> > > Encoding: 7bit
> > >
> > > Name: ForEach.java
> > > ForEach.java Type: text/x-java
> > > Encoding: 7bit
> >
> --
> Matt Inger ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
> Sedona Corporation
> 455 S. Gulph Road, Suite 300
> King of Prussia, PA 19406
> (484) 679-2213
> "Self-respect - the secure feeling that no one,
> as yet, is suspicious." -H.L. Mencken
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