Re: Build systems suck. Can Lua be the basis for a better build system?

[Miles Bader <miles@...>]

steve donovan <steve.j.donovan@gmail.com> writes:
>> as I've been programming, (which is a fairly long time.)), that I really,
>> really hate build systems.
>
> Amen!  I know building software is a messy business, but why must it
> be so much less elegant?


The thing is, that _everybody_ realizes this, and _almost_ everybody's
attempted solve it (at least since I've been aware of such things
since the mid-80s).  "A better build system" is one of the classic
programs most good programmers write at some point.

Unfortunately here we are in 2012, with most make alternatives being
only slightly less horrible, and usually having their own problems.

The lesson I draw from this that it's a harder problem than people
realize... :]

Having a nice elegant small language like Lua as _part_ of a build
system would of course be better than a grotty horrible language
(cmake, etc), or a huge bloated one (python), but ... I'm not sure the
language used is really the main issue...

-miles

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