This week, I began my first foray into using build systems with Apache Ant, and I must say it was a bit confusing and frustrating at times. The task seemed simple enough at the outset: create a few build scripts to compile and run a sort of "Hello World" java program, as well as a few other things.
I would guess that no more than two minutes passed before I encountered my first error. But this being my first ever experience with Apache Ant or build systems in general, it was to be expected. At one point I remember thinking to myself, "I thought this was supposed to make life easier?" as yet another "BUILD FAILED" message stared smugly back at me. But if theres one thing I've learned from my experiences with trying new things related to programming, it's that there is always a learning curve, and that you have to struggle through it the first few times in order to get better.
All joking aside, eventually I was able to complete the assignment after some headaches. However, I think these katas (practice exercises) taught me a few valuable things. The first, and most obvious thing I learned was the syntax required for Apache Ant. Personally I feel its more important to get a general feel for how things work rather than memorize the specific syntax. I think I was able to do that as well through these katas.
Another thing I learned was that working with filepaths can be a little confusing at times, because there are two filepath types: relative and absolute. I learned that its pretty easy to type the wrong file path and have to deal with some cryptic errors because of it.
Overall, these katas helped me visualize how large scale projects need build systems to satisfy Prime Directive #2, which checks that a system can be installed by users or other programmers. I think this will come in handy later on when I start writing some bigger programs.
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