“Ant, an open source Java project, has been gaining in usage and
attention lately — and rightfully so. Ant is driving ease of use
in cross-platform software development by dragging the redoubtable
“make”-style of build tool into this new century. But where did Ant
come from?”
“Ant is based at the Apache Jakarta project’s site (see
resources listed at the end of this article), which says Ant is
“kind of like make without make’s wrinkles”. It goes on to explain
the reasoning behind the development of a replacement for make and
make-like programs: all of these programs have serious flaws when
it comes to building cross-platform software, which is of
particular impact for certain Java projects.”
“As such, Ant is an ideal choice for building other Java-based
projects, although it can also be used for building projects
written in other languages.”
Web Webster has more than 20 years of writing and editorial experience in the tech sector. He’s written and edited news, demand generation, user-focused, and thought leadership content for business software solutions, consumer tech, and Linux Today, he edits and writes for a portfolio of tech industry news and analysis websites including webopedia.com, and DatabaseJournal.com.
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