undefined | Better HN

0 pointsdrowsspa1y ago0 comments

Honestly I like it just to keep it as a command runner with the needed flags. Then in the unholy YAML there's just make build, make test, etc

0 comments

maccard1y ago

At that point you end up with a makefile that has a 1:1 mapping with targets in my experience. At a previous job, we had an enormous makefile, most of which was defining phone targets and translating make arguments into maven arguments. All the actual targets were calling maven. Make provided no value at all in that, other than requiring you to know Make and maven to modify anything in the build.

Personally I’d rather a shell script for a command runner in most cases

drowsspaOP1y ago

Yeah, mine often just defers back to some shell scripts. But it's useful to enumerate them in the Makefile.

tom_1y ago

If you have a telltale prefix for any internal phony targets (I use "_"), then you can have the Makefile list all the interesting targets itself. Cat the Makefile, print every line matching "^\.PHONY:[[:space:]]*[^_]", then strip out the prefix. Leave any suffix, as you can put a trailing comment in, e.g.,

    .PHONY:build_windows # build for Windows. Supply DEBUG=1 for a debug build

I find this super useful. Even if you remember exactly what the target was called, it still gives you a nice list of words you can double click on to pull into the command line.

pdimitar1y ago

The `just` tool is a better and much easier to understand command runner than `make`, however. Much less feature surface, too, which eliminates nasty surprises coming from the unnecessary complexity of `make`.

drowsspaOP1y ago

There are a pletora of tools better than Make. But it's a standard tool, everyone is familiar with it, you probably don't even have to install it.

pdimitar1y ago

`just` is 90% similar to `make` in syntax, only it has 100x less foot guns. :)

Also I'll never understand the appeal of "not having to install a tool". We're not in the 1980s anymore when that was an actual chore. You run a command, the tool is there (including in CI/CD), boom, done. What am I missing here?

The advantages you list are flimsy at best.

1 more reply

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

0 comments

maccard1y ago

Personally I’d rather a shell script for a command runner in most cases

drowsspaOP1y ago

Yeah, mine often just defers back to some shell scripts. But it's useful to enumerate them in the Makefile.

tom_1y ago

    .PHONY:build_windows # build for Windows. Supply DEBUG=1 for a debug build

I find this super useful. Even if you remember exactly what the target was called, it still gives you a nice list of words you can double click on to pull into the command line.

pdimitar1y ago

drowsspaOP1y ago

There are a pletora of tools better than Make. But it's a standard tool, everyone is familiar with it, you probably don't even have to install it.

pdimitar1y ago

`just` is 90% similar to `make` in syntax, only it has 100x less foot guns. :)

The advantages you list are flimsy at best.

1 more reply

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse