[seam-dev] the shackles have been removed from seam-gen (upgrade #2)

[Shane Bryzak]

Awesome work Dan, I can't wait to try this out.

Dan Allen wrote:
> The seam script (which we all call seam-gen) just got another upgrade
> tonight, this time focused on the build. Up to this point, the seam
> script has been a couple steps behind other project generation tools,
> such as Grails, because the user has been locked into having to run it
> from a Seam distribution directory. You may know from using Grails
> that their approach is to add grails to your PATH and set GRAILS_HOME
> and use it like a system command. I have an approach that falls
> somewhere in between and frankly is more intelligent.
>
> First and foremost, i have unlocked us from having to run the seam
> script from the Seam distribution directory. Now you can run it out of
> any directory on the computer and it will work as it does today
> (meaning your current working directory can be anywhere). Internally
> it figures out your current directory and the SEAM_HOME environment
> variable relative to the location of the script (there is really no
> reason to make the user set this environment variable, that is just a
> stupid requirement). More on the current working directory in a
> second. Btw, I also put in a check that the user has JAVA_HOME
> pointing to a JDK because otherwise the Ant build is going to fail
> anyway.
>
> As you may know, I have been moving build.properties into the project
> as the file seam-gen.properties since last spring (really since Seam
> 2.0). We just haven't done anything with it...until now. Here is the
> big enhancement.
>
> If your current working directory happens to be a directory that has a
> seam-gen.properties file AND and build.xml file, then the seam script
> recognizes that you are in a Seam project and operates using the
> seam-gen.properties file in that directory rather than the
> seam-gen/build.properties from the Seam distribution. If you put the
> seam script on your PATH, then you can simply enter a project and run
> "seam generate". If you are too lazy to put it on your PATH, then you
> have to run something like "~/projects/seam-trunk/seam generate".
> Either way, it will work. Btw, I also fixed the Windows batch script
> (which was really no fun at all. Windows sucks. It's like playing with
> those really big legos that you give 3 year olds).
>
> On top of that, the outputs after the generate command are aware of
> whether you are running the seam script outside a project or inside a
> project and thus tell you to use seam or ant respectively. For
> example, if you run "seam generate" from within a project, it will
> tell you to run "ant restart" (instead of "seam restart") after it is
> done its work (no need to keep having to go through the seam script).
>
> The next steps I guess are for JBossTools to use the
> seam-gen.properties inside the project (if it doesn't already). As far
> as JBossTools is concerned, it doesn't really care where the
> properties file is because it has the advantage of being aware of the
> workspace. Most of the upgrades here had to happen in the seam script.
>
> I am going to take this message and the previous one about the
> seam-gen upgrades and do a blog entry on in.relation.to in a day or
> so.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Dan
>
>