What is build automation software (for example, Ant)?

Question

I see reference of ant a lot but I don\'t get exactly what its meant to do? from what i\'ve heard its supposed to compile your projects but can\'t i just do that by clicking Run

Answer 1

If there's one close to you I think you'd get a lot out of CITCON, the Continuous Integration and Testing Conference. You get to talk with lots of people about the benefits of automation applied to building and testing software.

Basically people use Ant (with other tools) to automate everything they want to have happen after a commit. The basic advantages of such automation are faster, better and cheaper.

Faster because things happen right away without waiting for a human to get around to it.

Better because computers are really really good at doing the same thing the same way every time. (Humans tend to suck at that.)

Cheaper because you have fewer mistake and the mistakes that occur are caught sooner and therefore cheaper to fix.