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Mill: A fast JVM build tool for Java and Scala

mill-build.org

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Re: Mill: A fast JVM build tool for Java and Scala

#51

Post by rykad »

kaba0 wrote: post #34
rykad wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be blunt, nothing. The issue is that most people in jvm land are on a closed bubble and haven't seen anything else. This is true for build systems as is for non OO design for example. Most simply don't know better and the rest of us are simply stuck. Ant and then Maven started simple enough but people always find a way to justify adding more stuff. Gradle already started complex enough and they keep adding more st…

To be blunt, if anything it might be you who live in a closed bubble. Builds that require ad-hoc functionality is the default. It’s extremely rare that everything fits nicely into “cargo build” or other single language build tools’ model. And while these often have escape hatches, at that point you have to write imperative code with no caching and parallelization that is literally the job of a build tool.

I've been doing jvm apps for almost 20yrs... What builds need to do and what people made the builds do are completely different things. I don't remember a single project I was involved in that could not had had a simpler build...

Re: Mill: A fast JVM build tool for Java and Scala

#52

Post by Axnyff »

lihaoyi wrote: post #25

Author here! Hope you take a look at the project and find it cool. There's a lot of interesting stuff here. In particular, the Video linked on the landing page is a great intros from a Java developer point of view, and the following video is a great intro from a Build Tool Architect point of view: * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsXgCeU-ovI While Mill is focusing on JVM for now, it is very extensible and I have a s…

Hi, it looks pretty interesting! There's a broken link in the homepage though, Mill vs sbt links to the gradle page

Good luck for your project!

Re: Mill: A fast JVM build tool for Java and Scala

#54

Post by galdosdi »

msl09 wrote: post #53

Nice try, I'm still not going to write scala code.

Build times always were my biggest Scala complaint. Arguably code base specific, as I suspect it had a lot to do with all the macros and type level metaprogramming, but, if that kind of thing is possible and customary, an average working programmer who doesn't control the codebase they show up to is going to end up stuck dealing with it.

It's a lot easier to build a language that works great, but only in the hands of a single skilled careful owner, than a language that stands up to the abuse of many careless temporary users, and still gets from point A to point B reliably.

Like the difference between a sportscar and a rental company or police fleet sedan.

Scala was a porsche, but most of us need camrys.

Re: Mill: A fast JVM build tool for Java and Scala

#55

Post by dcminter »

dikei wrote: post #18
potamic wrote: post #4

What tends to be complex about build requirements that necessitates special purpose tools? Golang seems to be doing fine with just go build and go test. What else are people doing with gradle/maven that requires static typing, DAGs, plugins etc.?

In JVM world, the de factor equivalent to `go build` and `go test` are `mvn compile` and `mvn test`, which works 99% percent of the time. Other build tools and plugins just compete/fill in for: * improved build speed / test speed: using background daemon to reduce strtup speed, intelligent caching / task reordering to avoid redoing, etc.. * extra functionalities like code generation, publishing or deployments. As cod…

Curmudgeon here: this was true for a relatively brief period of time. Nowadays I'd say that gradle has (inexplicably to me) taken the lead - and everyone adds custom crap to their gradle build making them far less predictable than maven builds used to be.

I guess it's better than the nightmare over in the front-enders' world...

Re: Mill: A fast JVM build tool for Java and Scala

#56

Post by wiradikusuma »

lihaoyi wrote: post #25

Author here! Hope you take a look at the project and find it cool. There's a lot of interesting stuff here. In particular, the Video linked on the landing page is a great intros from a Java developer point of view, and the following video is a great intro from a Build Tool Architect point of view: * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsXgCeU-ovI While Mill is focusing on JVM for now, it is very extensible and I have a s…

Does it support Quarkus (esp. native build)?

Re: Mill: A fast JVM build tool for Java and Scala

#57

Post by whoodle »

Sorry to hijack this thread a bit, but I currently work at a Scala shop and have grown to like writing it. I worked at Clojure heavy place previously. This tool looks neat.

Has anyone at the senior level recently moved on from Scala to other languages recently? Any issue finding jobs or learning the new role?

Re: Mill: A fast JVM build tool for Java and Scala

#58

Post by [deleted] »

whoodle wrote: post #57

Sorry to hijack this thread a bit, but I currently work at a Scala shop and have grown to like writing it. I worked at Clojure heavy place previously. This tool looks neat. Has anyone at the senior level recently moved on from Scala to other languages recently? Any issue finding jobs or learning the new role?

[deleted]

Re: Mill: A fast JVM build tool for Java and Scala

#59

Post by skybrian »

lihaoyi wrote: post #33
iamcalledrob wrote: post #7

It's not clear to me how this is better than Gradle. And I hate Gradle. At first glance, Mill looks like it has many of the pitfalls of Gradle: - Plugins: Creates the temptation to rely on plugins for everything, and suddenly you're in plugin dependency hell with no idea how anything actually works. - Build scripts written in a DSL on top of a new language: Now I have to learn Scala and your DSL. I don't want to do e…

Author here! The issue here is that builds, and many other "just configuration" scenarios, are fundamentally complex. So many projects that start off as "just XML" or "just YAML" end up implementing their own half-baked programming language interepreter inside of their XML/YAML/JSON/whatever. Examples: * Github Actions Config Expressions https://docs.github.com/en/actions/writing-workflows/choosin... * CloudFormation…

I agree that Bazel did pretty well with Starlark, but the reason that’s sane is because it’s not Python, though the syntax is similar. It avoids getting into trouble with people using Python language features that would result in upgrade hell and annoy other programmers who aren’t Python experts.

(Though, debugging complicated Starlark code can still be difficult.)

So why not use Starlark? :)

Re: Mill: A fast JVM build tool for Java and Scala

#60

Post by wocram »

lihaoyi wrote: post #26
jiehong wrote: post #19

Why not compare it to bazel/pants/buck2 as well? Mill seems to have taken some inspiration from those as well.

Author here. It does! I started working on Mill when I started learning Bazel, during my first months at Databricks. There's a lot of cross-pollination of ideas there, from my 7 years adopting and maintaining the Bazel build at Databricks, but I haven't had time to do a proper head-to-head comparison. Hopefully someone else can though!

What drove you away from Bazel?

I would expect anyone considering migrating away from a "legacy" tool like maven would consider a "modern" tool like Bazel first.

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