Integration Watch: Maven goes commercial

By Andrew Binstock

December 15, 2008 —

As I discussed in this column months ago, Ant is by no means the only—nor is it necessarily the best—build tool for Java environments. Rather, Ant is the universal build tool; it can handle any build task well. But it needs lots of configuration to do so.

When you specify what the steps should be, how they should be performed and the order in which they should be executed, Ant faithfully chugs down the list, completing one task after another. The extensive directions are the price Ant exacts for its flexibility. And in that way, it is reminiscent of the make utility, except that it uses XML for its syntax.

Ant is verbose because it uses no particular build model. In fact, such basic functions such as JUnit were not bundled with Ant until recently.

Jason van Zyl, the force behind Maven, recognized that a tool designed around a comprehensive build model could eliminate a lot of the overhead in Ant scripts. So he devised a basic tool blueprint that included naming and location conventions for project files, an artifact repository and—crucially—the ability to follow a default compile-test-package-install-deploy build model without being told to do so at each stage. In addition, he figured that many sites would want reports on the project build, so Maven generates an entire website with status information and has a simple mechanism for adding more reports.

Essentially, Maven embraces the Ruby on Rails creed: convention over configuration. (Actually, Maven predates Rails, but Rails made the expression famous.) And, as with Rails, if you follow the Maven conventions, your time spent configuring is greatly reduced. Maven has found wide adoption over the years, and its user community continues to grow.

One problem that developers interested in adopting Maven faced in the past was the paucity of good documentation. For years, there were only scribbles on the Apache website, and developers had to figure things out for themselves. Eventually, van Zyl and other Maven developers published “Better Builds with Maven,” which finally gave Ant escapees a way into the fold. That book is still available for free download, but read on before getting it.

A successful product, a large installed base, a thirst for information—you’re looking at the ingredients for a startup. In 2007, the major Maven contributors launched Sonatype, a Silicon Valley company that specializes in tools to extend Maven, and that provides professional tech support. (Maven, now under the aegis of the Apache Software Foundation, remains free open-source software [FOSS].)

One of Maven’s unique strengths is that it automatically downloads needed JAR files and libraries from any of several repositories on the Web. It stores those artifacts on the build server and refreshes them when new versions become available.

At sites with many projects, Maven repositories can become fairly large and difficult to manage. Thus Sonatype released Nexus, a FOSS tool that manages Maven repositories and their contents. Sonatype expects to release a commercial version that will have a superset of features of interest to enterprise development organizations.

Sonatype is also expanding m2eclipse, a Maven-oriented Eclipse plug-in that eases editing of Maven configuration files (called Project Object Model files). Planned commercial versions of m2eclipse from Sonatype will be supersets of the FOSS plug-in.

Finally, there’s new documentation. Sonatype wrote a 400-page vade mecum called “Maven: The Definitive Guide,” which was just released in print by O’Reilly Media and is available as a free PDF from Sonatype. The book is more complete than the one mentioned earlier, but it lacks coverage of some important topics. In discussion with the authors, I was told that updates would be posted regularly to the online version.

I have been using both Ant and Maven on my current projects. I like Maven’s model and how much it gives me for free. However, I have been sympathetic to the many organizations that did not want to try it for lack of good documentation, lack of paid support, and the usual concerns that make large enterprises goosey about adopting specific FOSS solutions.

By productizing Maven tools and commercializing support, Sonatype gives large Java (and .NET) sites a valid entry point to making their builds a lot easier.

Andrew Binstock is the principal analyst at Pacific Data Works. Read his blog at binstock.blogspot.com.

Related Search Term(s): Ant, Java, Maven, open source, Sonatype

Share this link: http://www.sdtimes.com/link/33109

Sonatype names former Zend exec Mark de Visser as CEO Jason van Zyl, the creator of the Maven, praised the appointment of Mark de Visser, who last worked at Zend, the company behind the PHP language. De Visser is expected to lend his expertise in growing the Maven community and improving its code quality.

Nexus Pro addresses enterprise repository woes In an attempt to ease some of the processes involved in managing Maven repositories and protecting against open-source policy violations, Sonatype's Nexus Professional can automate and organize those processes.

In tough financial times, open source got more than a look It was a year of infrastructure, it was a year of enhanced development tools. But most of all, it was the year in which repositories grew up and mobile phones opened up.

Add comment

Name*
Email*
Country

Comment
Preview

News on Monday
more>>
SharePoint Tech Report
more>>

Download Current Issue
ISSUE 3/15/2010 PDF

Need Back Issues?
DOWNLOAD HERE

Receive the print Edition?

Google Code turns 5
Google Code Turns 5, and adds a Paxos Algorithm to make the system more stable and reliable.
03/17/2010 11:16 AM EST

Test your Visual Studio 2010 know-how
Microsoft is offering free beta certification exams for Visual Studio 2010.
03/17/2010 11:08 AM EST

Microsoft lifts the hood on IE9
Microsoft is previewing IE9.
03/16/2010 01:10 PM EST