On Thu, Oct 14, 2010 at 7:25 PM, Kenneth McDonald <kenneth.m.mcdon...@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> 1) Maven is declarative vs. procedural. This is great, but Prolog has been > that > way for decades. Why build such a complex syntax when a much simpler one > already existed. That's comparing apples and peaches. Prolog is a general-purpose language [1], whereas Maven is dedicated to a particular type of task. Obviously, it's much more feasible to have a declarative approach for the latter. > 2) Relates to 1). I still think this is important. AFAIK, XML was NEVER > intended to > be a syntax for direct editing by the user. It is needlessly verbose and > redundant, > and seriously obscures the actual intent of the code. As the simplest possible > example, what is the point in writing > <someGenericOption>false</someGenericOption> > when what is really meant is the (IMHO) much easier to read someGenericOption > = false. That's basically XML bashing. You might have problems with editing XML, I don't. Apart from that, you are reducing what Maven gives you to a syntactical discussion here, which doesn't make too much sense for me. As other have rightfully pointed out, there are very comfortable editors for Maven POM's, which easily hide the XML syntax. XML is wonderful for building tools and editors. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prolog > 3) Yes, I'm aware there is something called polyglot maven. (Haven't looked > at it yet, as > I don't want to add yet another layer of complexity to what I'm doing.) > Doesn't the simple > existence of this prove my point? There were never polyglot makefiles--in > spite of all > of their (numerous) problems, the syntax of makefiles was simple enough there > was > never a demand for them. It proves the point that people like you are enjoying discussions about syntax. :-) > 4) Maybe I'm missing something, but maven seems to be all about predefined > maven > tasks. (Not sure I'm using the right terminology). If there's something > simple I can do > from the command line, maven doesn't provide an obvious way for me to do it. You are obvoiusly missing the ability to create own Maven plugins. Others are doing this, hence there are hundreds or even thousands. You can choose between using and combining existing ones (which most of us prefer) and writing your own. > 5) Maven is just too complex. The comment I've seen is, "If users would just > read a > book...", but what if I don't have the time to read an entire book simply to > figure out how > to push my docs to github? With command-line access, I wouldn't need to do > so. And > if the project got so big that an ad hoc solution didn't suffice, _then_ I > could come back > and read the book. I never needed a book to work with Maven. Books are for those who *like* to have books. If you are one of them, good for you to *have* them. If not, you neither need one. Jochen -- I Am What I Am And That's All What I Yam (Popeye) --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@maven.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@maven.apache.org
