hello all,

i'm looking for a more elegant/efficient solution to a problem we have
in our build scripts.
our source code is fairly unorganized as an organization, and as we've
grown and added systems it has become unwieldy. this is more of a
process problem than an ANT script problem, but i'm hoping i can come
up with a short term solution before we can get around to
re-architecting our entire system.

our source code is broken up by JAR files.  obviously, some of these
JAR files rely on other JAR files to work properly.  i've managed to
cobble together a full build that currently builds all of our
deliverables in build-dependency order, but i would like to be able to
build components (and their dependencies) individually.
for example:
JAR A depends on JAR B and JAR C
when building JAR A, if JAR B and JAR C do not exist, build them
first, then continue with A

i know this can lead to a monstrous build chain where dependencies are
building dependencies... ad infinitum.  but i am hoping this is a
short term solution. :)

at the moment i have a target in the build.xml for deliverable A that
is called 'dependencies'.  this target looks to see if the JAR files
for B and C exist, if not, use the ant task to build B and\or C, then
continue building A.  this works but is a pain to maintain as
dependencies change and new deliverables are added or removed.  it
also requires updating the actual scripts regularly.  an example is
pasted at the bottom.

is there a better solution for this?  is there an easy way to just
read in a file containing the JAR dependencies and iterating through
that to check/build so we would only have to update a list or
properties file?
any thoughts or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

thanks!
andy



example:
in this instance we're building the a deliverable/JAR that depends on
only one other JAR, core.  the 'build' target is executed but depends
on 'core.dependency'.  'core.dependency' depends on
'check.dependencies' which just determines if the required JAR files
are located in the central lib/ dir.  if they exist, all is good and
the initial deliverable is built.  if they don't exist a flag,
'build.core', is set so we know that core needs to be built first.  an
ANT task is executed in 'core.dependency' telling core to build
itself.

        <target name="check.dependencies" depends="init" unless="BUB">
                <condition property="build.core">
                        <available file="${lib.dir}/core.jar"/>
                </condition>      
        </target>
        
        <target name="core.dependency" depends="check.dependencies"
unless="build.core">
                <ant dir="${dev.root}/${core.path}" inheritAll="false" />
        </target>
        
        <target name="build" depends="core.dependency">
                <ant antfile="${build.root}/product_build.xml" inheritAll="true" 
/>
        </target>

this is a fairly simple example.  in some situations we have a
deliverable that depends on 10-15 other JAR files.  so those build
files become large rather quickly.  when new deliverables or
dependencies are introduced there can be quite a bit of coding/logic
involved to add them...

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