Speak by "dctrl — studio for creative technology" at Swiss Flash User Group Meeting from 20.01.2009 More infos: https://dctrl.ch

1. Deploy
Flex with
Apache Ant
Swiss Flash User Group (sfug)
Zürich | 20. Januar 2009

2. Hello my name is
Andreas Lorenz
dctrl - interactive media gmbh

3. 1
Ant Overview
The basics

4. Without Ant

5. With Ant

6. What is Ant?
1. An XML based custom build tool
2. Open source & well documented
3. Standardized & widely used
4. Implemented in Java
5. Platform independent

7. Ant Goals
Create a continuous integration based
build process:
• Centralized
• Automated
• Self-Testing

8. Usage
1. Don‘t do work you‘ve already done
2. Do alot of tasks once
3. Prevent Mistakes

9. What Ant can do
1. Build swf
2. Do UnitTest‘s
3. Generate ASDoc‘s & SWC Files
4. Build template files
5. Combine Flex projects, modules, assets
6. Copy, zip, ftp, svn
7. Source distribution

10. 2
Ant Basics
Creating Issues

11. Installing Ant
1. http://ant.apache.org
2. Bundled with IDE‘s like Eclipse

12. Directory structure
/ project
/ ant
/ build
/ dist
/ html-template
/ src

13. 3
Ant Structure
Creating Issues

14. Files
1. Build file «build.xml»
2. Main property file «build.properties»
3. Local property file «build.mac.properties»

15. build.properties
1. Separate data from the process
2. Configuration file
3. Re-usability
4. Not under SVN

16. build.properties
Referenced by ${var}
# default pathes
main.path = dctrl/project
src.path = ${ main.path}/ src

17. build.xml
1. One «build.xml» file per project
2. Each build use targets
3. Each target use tasks
4. Each task has properties

18. build.xml structure
Example:
<project name=quot;examplequot; default=quot;helloquot; basedir=quot;.quot;>
<property name=quot;string.varquot; value=quot;Hello Worldquot;/>
<target name=quot;helloquot;>
<echo message=quot;${string.var}quot; />
</target>
</project>

19. Build output

20. <project>
Root element
4 attributes:
1. name - projectname (optional)
2. basedir - reference (optional)
3. default - target (required)
4. description - info (optional)

21. <project>
Example:
<project name=”hello” default=”main” basedir=”.”
description=“standard build“>

22. <property>
1. User defined variables
2. Case sensitive
3. Defined in build.xml or build.properties
4. Reference by ${var}
5. System properties ${os.name}
6. Built-in properties ${ant.java.version}

23. <property>
Example:
<property file=quot;build.propertiesquot; />
<property name=quot;compile.debugquot; value=quot;truequot;/>
<echo>The main path is ${ main.path }</echo>
<echo>The debug state is ${ compile.debug }</echo>

24. <target>
1. A <project> has one or more <target>
2. Wrapper for a sequences of actions (tasks)
3. Can depend on other <target>
4. Executes only once

25. <target>
5 attributes:
1. name - target reference
2. depends - other targets (optional)
3. if - conditional (optional)
4. unless - converse of if (optional)
5. description - info (optional)

26. <target>
Example:
<target name=quot;jarquot; depends=quot;compilequot;
description=quot;create a Jar file for the applicationquot;>
<target name=quot;jarquot; if=quot;gui_readyquot;>
<target name=quot;jarquot; unless=quot;gui_readyquot;>

27. <task>
1. Ant built-in Java commands (tasks)
2. Additional tasks like flexTasks (JAR files)
3. Custom Java commands
4. Independent executed code
5. Wrapped in a <target>
6. Can have multiple attributes

28. <task>
Example:
<target name=quot;compilequot; depends=quot;initquot;>
<!- - Compile the java code - ->
<javac srcdir=quot;${src}quot; destdir=quot;${build}quot;/>
</target>

29. <task>
Ant built-in tasks:
Ant Exec GZip Replace Unzip
AntCall ExecOn Jar Style Zip
Available Fail Mail Tar
Copy Filter Mkdir Taskdef
Delete Get Move Touch
Echo GUnzip Property Tstamp

30. <task>
Optional tasks (must install JAR files):
FTP
SVN
Mail
FlexTasks

31. Events
Ant generates events as it executes:
1. Build started/finished
2. Target Build started/finished
3. Task Build started/finished
4. Message logged

32. 4
A Typical Project
Examples

33. 5
Some more infos
before you start your own

34. Resources
Homepage: http://ant.apache.org
User Manual: http://jakarta.apache.org/ant/manual/index.html
Wiki: http://wiki.apache.org/ant/FrontPage
FAQ: http://ant.apache.org/faq.html
Books: http://sourceforge.net/projects/antbook
Apache Ant Resources: http://jakarta.apache.org/ant/resources.html
Apache Ant 1.5 Manual: http://jakarta.apache.org/ant/manual/index.html
Flex Ant Tasks: http://labs.adobe.com/wiki/index.php/Flex_Ant_Tasks

35. Thanks!
al@dctrl.ch , www.dctrl.ch
www.slideshare.net/dctrl/deploy-flex-with-apache-ant-presentation