That gets back to the question of why change in the first place... build files
may be smaller and easier to maintain, but there may not be a good reason!
-David
> On 20 Apr 2015, at 09:37, Pierre Smits <pierre.sm...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> David,
>
> Thanks for sharing your insights. You talk about 'pretty much anything
> can be done with'. What, in your experience, can't be done -at the
> moment- in relation to OFBiz?
>
> Best regards,
>
> Pierre
>
> Op maandag 20 april 2015 heeft David E. Jones <d...@me.com> het volgende
> geschreven:
>
>>
>> Not to muddy the waters... but Gradle might be a good alternative. There
>> is a lot more in it than Ant that "just works" without needing to be
>> explicit, especially when you follow Maven conventions for layout of src
>> directories.
>>
>> One big upside of Gradle is that all build files are Groovy scripts and
>> you can do pretty much anything in them. One downside is the learning
>> curve... there is an extensive DSL with pretty good documentation, but some
>> things that would seem simple are non-obvious (to put it generously). On
>> the other hand, there is fairly wide use so I still have yet to run
>> anything where I couldn't find a solution quickly with a google search.
>>
>> -David
>>
>>
>>> On 19 Apr 2015, at 22:51, Hans Bakker <mailingl...@antwebsystems.com
>> <javascript:;>> wrote:
>>>
>>> We should seriously consider the comments from Adam and move to maven.
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>> Hans
>>> antwebsystems.com
>>>
>>>
>>> On 18/04/15 00:41, Adam Heath wrote:
>>>>
>>>> On 04/17/2015 10:20 AM, Jacques Le Roux wrote:
>>>>> Thanks for your detailed heads-up Martin, notably your last point!
>>>>>
>>>>> I mostly agree, and indeed I also think Maven might not be so bad when
>> you start anew (or are forced to use it ;) ) but for OFBiz, really NO!
>>>>>
>>>>> Jacques
>>>>>
>>>>> Le 17/04/2015 16:27, Martin Becker a écrit :
>>>>>> +1 for lack of benefit (and for fear ;-))
>>>>
>>>> The commit I did last night took me 45 minutes. Full stop. I started
>> at 12:03am. And I did it while drinking a second beer. Maven was that
>> simple. I had resisted for years. Years! But when I actually sat down to
>> do it, I realized that I did *not* have to change what I was doing. Maven
>> could be configured to work with the existing design.
>>>>
>>>> The benefits are:
>>>>
>>>> * not having to write our own build system; ant is not a build system.
>>>>
>>>> * full external dependency management. This can be done very
>> incrementally. I just got framework/base to compile, by reusing the
>> previously downloaded jars in framework/base/lib. Then, when all
>> dependencies are *properly* listed, we can switch to the download
>> mechanism, and suddenly, the checkout becomes smaller.
>>>>
>>>> * full internal dependency support. As part of framework/base now
>> having a working pom.xml, it has a dep on framework/start. This can allow
>> for end-users wanting to just install applications/party, and having just
>> what is required get downloaded.
>>>>
>>>> * Each ofbiz component could be moved to separate repos, and
>> development can progress on its own. All that specialpurpose/* stuff no
>> longer needs to be carried along with the rest of the codebase.
>>>>
>>>> * continuous integration becomes so much simpler; the standard "mvn
>> package" call does command-line unit tests, *by default*.
>>>>
>>>> * these poms do not break anything. Nothing calls them. Everyone can
>> continue to use ant, eclipse, or DIP switches, to compile and run ofbiz.
>> So, having them in trunk won't cause issue for anyone else. This is the
>> way linux-kernel functions. Completely new, isolated features, that affect
>> no one else, are added to master/linux-next, so that they can get pushed
>> out to more users, for more testing. If something is done in a separate
>> branch, they have discovered it doesn't recieve enough widespread testing.
>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> My first thoughts:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> => If a change is desired, than Gradle would surely be a good choice
>> as it is the next generation build tool witch tries to combine the
>> advantages from tools like ant, maven and others…
>>>>
>>>> Sure, why not?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Besides, I'm the one who created ${ofbiz.home.dir}/macros.xml and
>> common.xml, but really, lets not go there.
>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> => I think the stability of Gradle is not a question as it is used by
>> projects like Spring, Hibernate, Grails, Groovy and others…
>>>>>>
>>>>>> => With the ability to use ant tasks and whole ant build scripts
>> within Gradle, a smooth migration could be an option
>>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Maven can call ant. I'm even doing so in the 2 poms that I added.
>>>>
>>>>>> => Maven rely on it’s convention over configuration pattern, so it is
>> never a good idea to NOT follow it’s conventions by configuring it for a
>> different project structure for example. So there may be the need for
>> massive changes to the OFBiz project structure and so on.
>>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> I just got framework/base to compile with maven. This includes *NO*
>> changes to ofbiz layout. framework/base/lib still exists. Nothing is being
>> downloaded(except maven plugins, of course).
>>>>
>>>>>> => Also the ability to only produce one artifact per project in maven
>> would perhaps end up in configuring sub projects for each application and
>> module in OFBiz with a frustrating handling of multi module configurations
>> with version-/release-tags, dependency handling and so on...
>>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> This is wrong. You can produce multiple artifacts. I've seen it done
>> in other projects.
>>>>
>>>>>> => I used maven in multi module project setups before and it has it’s
>> nice features, although it is sometimes hard to understand details and
>> effects of the build lifecycle or single plugins. But the main fact is,
>> that this were green-field projects, so things in terms of convention over
>> configuration are much easier to adopt than in legacy projects like an
>> OFBiz…
>>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>> => The change of the build tool for OFBiz would be a fundamental
>> change, particularly for upgrading existing installations. So a change to
>> the project structure could be a deathblow to OFBiz vendor imports in
>> customer projects. I think it could be a good starting point to look at
>> Gradle and see if there is a wise way to use the strength and new features
>> of a modern build tool without the need to turn things inside out in OFBiz.
>>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> I'm not just some noob in ofbiz. I've been around for quite a bit.
>> I've been around when ofbiz was still using CVS. I was the first to start
>> using git locally for ofbiz development, and for our own ofbiz
>> extensions/fixes/client work. I've also been invovled with Debian in years
>> past, being involved in several migrations. I also added generics(and
>> enhanced for loops, etc), to *all* of framework, to spearhead that
>> project. But seriously, moving on.
>>>>
>>>> But, what structure changes have I propsed? None. I've got it working
>> with the exsting layout. Nothing has turned inside out.
>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Martin Becker
>>>>>> ecomify GmbH
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Am 17.04.2015 um 13:56 schrieb Jacques Le Roux <
>> jacques.le.r...@les7arts.com <javascript:;>>:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Le 17/04/2015 12:49, Jacopo Cappellato a écrit :
>>>>>>>> On Apr 17, 2015, at 4:39 AM, Taher Alkhateeb <
>> slidingfilame...@gmail.com <javascript:;>> wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Hi All,
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Thank you for your work but I thought we are more inclined to move
>> to gradle based build systems given its many advantages as a full
>> programming language build system based on groovy.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Taher Alkhateeb
>>>>>>>> I agree: we could explore the switch to Gradle and also review the
>> way our source files (Java, Groovy and Minilang/xml) are organized (we
>> could actually follow the layout that is considered the default for Maven
>> and Gradle and possibly other tools).
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Jacopo
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I don't know if Gradle is stable now, but I'd surely be for instead
>> of Maven. If ever we really desire to move from Ant, I don't clearly see
>> the necessity at this stage...
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Jacques
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>
> --
> Pierre Smits
>
> *ORRTIZ.COM <http://www.orrtiz.com>*
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