Re:Python as a Build Tool
by unmdplyr on Thursday September 23, 2021 @10:39PM
(#28638052)
As someone who's been involved in build engineering for quite a while, I'm not sure how Python is suddenly going to solve some real life build problems?
Both Meson and Bazel use Python, a heavy weight language as a configuration tool rather than actual build language. From that perspective you might think it is a replacement to CMake. But it then it quickly introduces its own quirks.
In the end, there's no single best solution to building. You do you. And some sad soul contributing to buildroot2 or OpenWRT will wrap your whatever build with a bunch of Makefiles and shell scripts.
Re:Python as a Build Tool
by kevincox on Thursday September 23, 2021 @05:46PM
(#28635960)
Overall a good read but some comments.
1. How are partial rebuilds and dependencies handled? I assume that this is done from scratch based on only using the standard library but this seems like quite a bit if code to write. (Not exactly complex, but not trivial either.)
2. It days that Google fingured this out using Python for the build. This is presumably referring to Bazel but Bazel doesn't actually do the build in Python. You just write the build description in Python with very limited logic allowed. It is much more of a configuration language than a build script.
Both Meson and Bazel use Python, a heavy weight language as a configuration tool rather than actual build language. From that perspective you might think it is a replacement to CMake. But it then it quickly introduces its own quirks.
In the end, there's no single best solution to building. You do you. And some sad soul contributing to buildroot2 or OpenWRT will wrap your whatever build with a bunch of Makefiles and shell scripts.
1. How are partial rebuilds and dependencies handled? I assume that this is done from scratch based on only using the standard library but this seems like quite a bit if code to write. (Not exactly complex, but not trivial either.)
2. It days that Google fingured this out using Python for the build. This is presumably referring to Bazel but Bazel doesn't actually do the build in Python. You just write the build description in Python with very limited logic allowed. It is much more of a configuration language than a build script.