EJ Ciramella wrote:
Maven (2) works REALLY well with transitive dependencies (something ant
doesn't).
Agreed. Ivy and the maven2 tasks do this, though not so tightly integrated.
So much is available right out of the box (keeping build
files simple and easily maintained. Why would you want an additional
archive server? Why store things in your scm tool that won't be
versioned? Since all the jar files are in binary format, you're storing
the entire version when you check in a jar, not just the changes since
last version. In addition to this, I've seen companies have a lib
directory per branch/project. Why sync the same jar in two (or many
more) locations when you can keep it in one? This makes even more sense
when you have a bunch of projects that use the same binary. Having
maven maintain these binary files (and the associates classpaths) is so
much nicer than having some entry in an ant script.
Any project that considers longevity or offline rebuilding must think
about how to archive all their dependencies. What if the repositories go
away? What if a lawsuit forces some jar to be pulled.
You may also need a private repository to store stuff that isnt in open
source, or just not in the public repositories. This is no different
from putting the JARs in a lib/ dir, except you have to make up stub
poms that declare some or zero dependencies.
Being able to switch versions just by changing property files is nice...
About the directory structures - these CAN be overridden in maven, BUT
the beauty of this is by getting all the projects to conform, there's
less entry in the pom.xml files to say where is source, where do the
classes go, where does the built up jar go. Additionally, I've seen
over the years people sticking source where ever they feel it belongs.
Maven (when using the defaults) keeps everything properly packaged so
one project looks like the next (and so on...).
Maven is all about modularity - if you are forced to build everything at
once (utils/db/app/web/etc classes) and you have source level
dependencies, then this isn't for you. If you have a very modular
product (if you just need to deploy a new war with some freshly
recompiled classes that are at that level, not in some core package),
then maven makes handling these builds very easy.
I have had mixed experiences with it. Maven1 was trouble, especially
with its snapshot logic. I havent used m2 enough to come to an opinion.
On a side note, maven2 is horrendously documented. Be prepared to spend
a great deal of time tinkering and waiting for replies on the mailing
list if you opt to go this route.
I worry about its stability, though things are improving. The ant tasks
can be a bit up and down from version to version, which implies they
dont get tested enough.
-steve
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