I don't think you have a fair impression of Maven.  Maven 2 is a good
tool to help someone using Java implement exactly what you advise:
splitting up your projects logically into libraries.  Maven provides
the RubyGems+Hoe equivalent for Java to make that feasible to work
with.

There are some Maven functionalities that I'd like to see for Ruby (or
maybe I just don't yet know how to do them).  I'd like an easy
mechanism to have RubyGems store gems in a per-user location instead
of globally be default (I'm sure this is possible, but I just haven't
taken the time to do it yet).  Then, I want a simple way to list the
gems my project depends on and run a Rake task to install those
dependencies.  The purpose here is to do the equivalent of what
running mvn eclipse:eclipse does for a Java project: allow me to check
a project out, run a single command, and then be ready to start
developing.  I don't know what the typical approach here for Ruby is.

I'd also like to have Hoe work equally well if I'm using Rspec vs.
test/unit.  On the documentation front, I'm pretty certain there are
features of the Maven site tools that I'll miss in Ruby, but I haven't
put in the work yet to learn how it's done in the Ruby world to say
for sure.

I do think that with Ruby there can be a better/cleaner version of
Maven, but I still feel that Ruby does need a Maven. :)

- Stephen

On 2/23/07, Austin Ziegler <halostatue / gmail.com> wrote:
> On 2/23/07, Andrew Arrow <andrew / geni.com> wrote:
> > Is there a good maven for ruby yet?  Is capistrano the answer?  I want
> > to split my large rails project into like 20 separate projects and then
> > have a small skeleton rails app that just pulls the 20 together.
>
> Fortunately, Ruby doesn't need something as overengineered as Maven.
> If you need to subdivide your projects, just do so. Make them Ruby
> libraries that you can install yourself. Divide them logically; when
> you find out that it doesn't work, join them back together as you need
> to. Use the advantages of your source control tool without being tied
> to the concept of something like Maven.
>
> Capistrano is a deployment tool. Rake is a build tool. There's at
> least three cruise-control-like solutions. If you decide that, even
> internally, hoe gives you amazing tools that you don't have to use
> entirely (you can use hoe to test each component, package it as a gem,
> and then extend it to copy it to your deployment server instead of
> uploading it to RubyForge).
>
> And ... do you really need a "huge" rails project? If your project can
> be divided into twenty sub-projects, shouldn't you be doing it
> *properly* (making proper libs, etc.) and not depending on something
> like Maven to do it for you?
>
> -austin
> --
> Austin Ziegler * halostatue / gmail.com * http://www.halostatue.ca/
>                * austin / halostatue.ca * http://www.halostatue.ca/feed/
>                * austin / zieglers.ca
>
>


-- 
Stephen Duncan Jr
www.stephenduncanjr.com