RAKE – Ruby Make

This package contains Rake, a simple ruby build program with capabilities similar to make.

Rake has the following features:

  • Rakefiles (rake’s version of Makefiles) are completely defined in standard Ruby syntax. No XML files to edit. No quirky Makefile syntax to worry about (is that a tab or a space?)

  • Users can specify tasks with prerequisites.

  • Rake supports rule patterns to sythesize implicit tasks.

  • Rake is lightweight. It can be distributed with other projects as a single file. Projects that depend upon rake do not require that rake be installed on target systems.

Download

The latest version of rake can be found at

Online Resources can be found at …

Installation

Normal Installation

You can install rake with the following command.

% ruby install.rb

from its distribution directory.

GEM Installation

Download and install rake with the following.

gem install --remote rake

Roadmap

  • If you want to see how to invoke rake to build your projects, read on.

  • If you want to see the format of a Rakefile, see doc/rakefile.rdoc.

  • If you want to see the original announcement of rake, see doc/rational.rdoc.

  • If you want to see a glossary of terms, see doc/glossary.rdoc.

Simple Example

Once installed, you can run rake as follows …

% rake [options ...]  [VAR=VALUE ...]  [tasks...]

Type “rake –help” for an up-to-date option summary.

Invoking rake without any options or targets causes rake to look for a rakefile and invoke the default task in that rakefile.

For example, given a simple rakefile like this …

task :default => [:test]

task :test do
  ruby "test/unittest.rb"
end

The command 

$ rake

will invoke the default task. As default satisfies its prerequisites, the test task will run the unit tests for the package.

Other Make Reinvisionings …

Rake is a late entry in the make replacement field. Here are links to other projects with similar (and not so similar) goals.

Credits

Ryan Dlugosz

For the initial conversation that sparked Rake.

[email protected]

For the initial patch for rule support.

License

Rake is available under an MIT-style license.

:include: MIT-LICENSE

Support

The Rake homepage is rake.rubyforge.org. You can find the Rake RubyForge page at rubyforge.org/projects/rake.

Feel free to submit commits or feature requests. If you send a patch, remember to update the corresponding unit tests. If fact, I prefer new feature to be submitted in the form of new unit tests.

For other information, feel free to ask on the ruby-talk mailing list (which is mirrored to comp.lang.ruby) or contact [email protected].

Usage

Rake is invoked from the command line using:

% rake [<em>options</em> ...]  [<em>VAR</em>=<em>VALUE</em>]  [<em>targets</em> ...]

Options are:

name=value

Set the environment variable name to value during the execution of the rake command. You can access the value by using ENV[‘name’].

--dry-run (-n)

Do a dry run. Print the tasks invoked and executed, but do not actually execute any of the actions.

--help (-H)

Display some help text and exit.

--libdir directory (-I)

Add directory to the list of directories searched for require.

--nosearch (-N)

Do not search for a Rakefile in parent directories.

--prereqs (-P)

Display a list of all tasks and their immediate prerequisites.

--quiet (-q)

Do not echo commands from FileUtils.

--rakefile filename (-f)

Use filename as the name of the rakefile. The default rakefile names are rakefile and Rakefile (with rakefile taking precedence). If the rakefile is not found in the current directory, rake will search parent directories for a match. The directory where the Rakefile is found will become the current directory for the actions executed in the Rakefile.

--require name (-r)

Require name before executing the Rakefile.

--tasks (-T)

Display a list of the major tasks and their comments. Comments are defined using the “desc” command.

--trace (-t)

Turn on invoke/execute tracing.

--usage (-h)

Display a usage message and exit.

--verbose (-v)

Echo the Sys commands to standard output.

--version (-V)

Display the program version and exit.

In addition, any command line option of the form VAR=VALUE will be added to the environment hash ENV and may be tested in the Rakefile.

Rakefile Format

See doc/rakefile.rdoc for details on the Rakefile format.

Other stuff

Author

Jim Weirich <[email protected]>

Requires

Ruby 1.8.0 or later

License

Copyright 2003, 2004 by Jim Weirich. Released under an MIT-style license. See the LICENSE file included in the distribution.

Warranty

This software is provided “as is” and without any express or implied warranties, including, without limitation, the implied warranties of merchantibility and fitness for a particular purpose.