Return-Path: Delivered-To: apmail-jakarta-ant-dev-archive@jakarta.apache.org Received: (qmail 43900 invoked by uid 500); 28 Mar 2001 07:14:58 -0000 Mailing-List: contact ant-dev-help@jakarta.apache.org; run by ezmlm Precedence: bulk Reply-To: ant-dev@jakarta.apache.org list-help: list-unsubscribe: list-post: Delivered-To: mailing list ant-dev@jakarta.apache.org Received: (qmail 43891 invoked from network); 28 Mar 2001 07:14:57 -0000 Message-ID: <67FE02381F67D3119F960008C7845A2C0565A853@nt_syd_ex09.macbank> From: Tim Vernum To: "'ANT-dev'" Subject: RE: What is a 'declarative' language Date: Wed, 28 Mar 2001 17:14:31 +1000 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21) X-Spam-Rating: h31.sny.collab.net 1.6.2 0/1000/N > Making the build language suitable for parallelizing task > execution is a significant design goal, IMHO. > Easy-to-understand and low-maintenance are also significant > goals for the build language. Of these, low-maintenance is > probably the more important one, assuming that build-file > editors like Antidote become more available. That introduces the requirement that the buildfile be easy to parse/manipulate programmatically. Imperative languages are often hard to model graphically, while declarative languages tend to be better. That's not hard and fast, but for something like Antidote to work, the buildfile needs to be in a form for which it is possible to provide a usable GUI.