FDT and ANT | A User’s Guide – Part II
by Alan
In part one, I showed how to get started with FDT and Ant (live error checking, code hinting, dealing with the JRE error…). Part two is the start of incorporating Ant into your work-flow. I would classify these videos as beginner-ish, and starting to get into intermediate Ant.
Wir Sind Bereit!
I’ve recorded these videos in a slightly different fashion from the previous ones. I’ve opted for shorter, more focused videos. I’ve watched a lot of video tutorials and I generally watch the videos once all the way through, but then revisit them from time to time as a reference. When watched in this manner, longer videos are a pain. There might be one trick or tip I am looking for and then I am forced to scrub through a 7 minute video trying to find out where the instructor did ‘X’.
The templates I use in this video can be downloaded here. The project I use can be downloaded here.
Video One – Using Ant File Templates
Here I show how to import an Ant file template, then use that template to quickly create a build file.
Video Two – Exploring and Compiling The Template
After creating a simple build file from a template, I go over what the template’s code does, then run it. The template I use is the basis for most of my FDT builds. It’s a build that compiles my .swf, launches the debugger, opens my browser then navigates to my embeded .swf.
In this one I focus on resetting fcsh – how and why.
Video Four – Using Snippets and Creating A SWC
When editing Ant files in FDT, you actually have code snippets and auto-formatting, similar to what you have when editing Actionscript. I use the code snippet above and show how to quickly create a .SWC file.
[...] blog.alanklement // FDT and ANT | A User’s Guide – Part I FDT and ANT | A User’s Guide – Part II [...]
Great tutorials! Really helpful
I had some thoughts though: Are there any significant gains to using FDT:s ant tasks as opposed to the ordinary flex ant tasks provided with the SDK? I’m also thinking about portability. Wouldn’t it be better for me to go with the generic approach instead of the FDT approach if I for example had some open source project that I wanted others to take part in? Then I’d have build script that “anyone” could use no matter what platform/IDE they where developing on.
I’m not trying to come down on the FDT approach or anything. I use FDT myself and think the stuff you outline here looks great! But I’m thinking “what if I change IDE?” or “what if I need some other developer to work with the project and that person has another environment?”. So I’m trying to decide which way to go
What do you think?
I use the FDT tasks b/c the documentation is more accessible than flex ant tasks – FDT has ant documentation within Eclipse.
Honestly, I am not very familiar with flex ant tasks. I never had a need to explore them. I can’t speak on what is better.
At this point tho, I mostly use ANT tasks that are IDE independent such as FTP, SVN, SSH, moving files, renaming directories…
Perhaps break up your tasks into IDE specific tasks and then IDE agnostic tasks. Then someone can just write in their own IDE tasks, which probably would be just compiling.
[...] 12. ANT If you start working with an industry standard IDE like Eclipse or FlashDevelop, there will be a day when you need to automate the build- or other processes with ANT. Its fun, its easy and you should learn it http://blog.alanklement.com/2009/08/10/fdt-and-ant-a-users-guide-part-i/ http://blog.alanklement.com/2009/08/19/fdt-ant-part-two/ [...]
[...] haven’t seen the second part of this tutorial: FDT and ANT | A User’s Guide – Part II but I will. It seems to be focused on the use of the templates and [...]
Hi,
great a very detailed and useful tutorial! One thing I can’t seem to get to work is the template of the build.xml
I can’t import your file as a template because FDT says it is not allowed to use the dot syntax on vars? $project.name is illegal. How can that be sorted?
Thnx for all the effort!
Hmm it’s not the dots but the $ signs, somehow it wants $$ (did that but still not able to save it as a template)
I’m having some trouble getting snippets to work now
. I’ll soon be doing many more videos and tutorials very, very soon ( it’s gonna rock ).
In the mean time I’ll play with it and investigate.