Mailing-List: contact user-help@ant.apache.org; run by ezmlm
Precedence: bulk
Reply-To: "Ant Users List" <user@ant.apache.org>
Message-ID: <00a601c3b45f$94f4cd70$75640a0a@home>
From: "Nadav Soferman" <nadav@trivnet.com>
To: "Ant Users List" <user@ant.apache.org>,
	"Ant Developers List" <dev@ant.apache.org>
References: <72068298CD99104AAEDE2FDF89AC160D4C4B5F@avanti.corp.workscape.net>
Subject: Re: Invicta - a new open-source build management tool & framework
Date: Wed, 26 Nov 2003 22:55:09 +0200
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain;
	charset="windows-1255"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

RE: Invicta - a new open-source build management tool & frameworkHi,
Thanks for your comments (and compliments).
Here are answers to some questions that were raised (sorry for the delay):

- License:
    - The license is currently LGPL. It was GPL (it wasn't a
hallucination...) and was changed according to your suggestion. I understand
that GPL is problematic and LGPL is better, but I don't have enough
knowledge in the various open-source licenses. Invicta should be used freely
by anyone (similar to ANT) and an appropriate license should be used (any
suggestions?).


- Maven:

    - Scope: The scope of Maven is different from the scope of Invicta and
is much larger (Maven's). As stated on Maven's homepage, it is 'a project
management and project comprehension tool'. It manages various aspects of
project's (mainly Internet open-source projects) development, support, web
site and others. Among these aspects, there is the build management aspect.
Invicta concentrates on build management only (as ANT concentrates on the
actual build script) for any projects or software companies that need an
easy to maintain and customizable powerful build scripts for their
developers. As far as I can see it, conceptually Invicta may act in the
future as the build management module of projects that are based on Maven
and as a stand-alone module for other projects.

    - J2EE: As far as I understand the current version of Maven (and I don't
pretend to be an expert of this cool product), it is not targeted for J2EE
projects. The following is an example of a scenario for which I believe
Invicta can be useful:
        - A group of people or a software company develops one or more J2EE
projects.
        - The projects are built of multiple components with internal
dependencies. They might also depend on external projects or packages. There
are many components that share the same 'build profile'. Multiple developers
are working on the projects. They might not be build 'experts'. The build
manager definitely doesn't want to duplicate a lot of ANT code and maintain
it.
        - The build manager wants to write once (or none at all) powerful
build scripts that automatically perform actions such as:
                - Automatic creation of EJB descriptors and interfaces.
                - Pre-compilation of JSP files and automatic generation of
descriptor files.
                - Compilation of sources and packing in JAR files.
                - EJB compilation.
                - Various packing and distribution methods (WAR, EAR, ZIP).
                - Various deployment actions (for example: deploying an EJB
on a remote BEA WebLogic server).
                - Various other build-related tasks.
                - Any specific tasks of that software company or group of
people.
        - The build manager wants the developers (and also himself) to
easily define and maintain by themselves the components of the projects,
their types and their relations and to automatically get powerful build
scripts that can do all the build & deployment actions in a standard and a
convenient way.
        - These type definition files of the project acts as an integral
part of the project and can be used by the build manager (using Invicta) for
creating any required output according to their content.
        - Invicta should contain powerful component built-in types such as
JAR, WAR, Pre-compile-WAR, EAR, EJB, etc. It also allows build managers or
developers to create their own 'types' that can be shared by multiple
components, projects or groups/companies.


We'll update Invicta's site with some more general information about 'what
it is good for', including a detailed comparison with Maven.

I'm sorry for writing such a long mail...  If you want more information and
you don't want it to be on this mailing list, contact me directly (or read
more at http://invicta.sf.net).

Thanks again for your interest and comments. We'll be happy to receive any
comments you have (both the good and the bad ones :)
Nadav

----- Original Message -----
From: Stirling, Scott
To: Ant Users List
Sent: Monday, November 24, 2003 3:54 PM
Subject: RE: Invicta - a new open-source build management tool & framework


> From: Nadav Soferman [mailto:nadav@trivnet.com]
>
> Hi,
> Invicta is a new open-source tool and framework for
> managing a build environment. It is based on ANT.
> Take a look at:
>       http://invicta.sf.net
Hi,
It's similar to Maven, but without the Jelly scripting and with a better
project object model.
The license is GPL.  Why not LGPL or BSD-style?
The extent of documentation and diagrams for this tool is amazing for a
first announcement.  I'm curious how this project came about.  The content
on the site looks great.
Scott Stirling
Workscape, Inc.
***********************************************************************
This message is intended only for the use of the intended recipient and
may contain information that is PRIVILEGED and/or CONFIDENTIAL.  If you
are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any use,
dissemination, disclosure or copying of this communication is strictly
prohibited.  If you have received this communication in error, please
destroy all copies of this message and its attachments and notify us
immediately.
***********************************************************************


---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: user-unsubscribe@ant.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: user-help@ant.apache.org


---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: user-unsubscribe@ant.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: user-help@ant.apache.org