Jake is a JavaScript build tool for Node.js, similar to Make or Rake. It is designed to automate the building of complex tasks, running shell commands, and managing file operations. Jake can be used for a wide range of automation tasks, from minifying and compiling code to running tests and deploying applications.
Task definition and execution
This feature allows you to define and execute tasks. In the code sample, a default task is defined which depends on another task named 'dependency'. When the default task is run, it first ensures that the 'dependency' task is executed.
"use strict";
let jake = require('jake');
task('default', ['dependency'], function () {
console.log('Running default task');
});
task('dependency', function () {
console.log('Running dependency task');
});File operations
Jake can perform various file operations such as creating directories, copying files, and iterating over sets of files. In this example, a task named 'createFile' is defined to process all JavaScript files in the current directory, create a new directory named 'build', and copy all files from 'src/' to 'build/'.
"use strict";
let jake = require('jake');
task('createFile', function () {
jake.FileList('*.js').forEach(function (file) {
console.log('Processing file: ' + file);
});
jake.mkdirP('build');
jake.cpR('src/', 'build/');
});Running shell commands
Jake allows you to run shell commands directly from your tasks. This example shows a task named 'deploy' that runs a shell command to push changes to the master branch of a git repository. The output of the command is printed to the console.
"use strict";
let jake = require('jake');
task('deploy', function () {
let command = 'git push origin master';
jake.exec(command, {printStdout: true}, function () {
console.log('Deployed to master');
});
});Gulp is a toolkit for automating painful or time-consuming tasks in your development workflow. It is stream-based, which can make it faster for I/O tasks compared to Jake. Gulp uses code over configuration strategy, making it more intuitive for JavaScript developers.
Grunt is a JavaScript task runner that offers a wide array of plugins for automating almost any task. Unlike Jake, Grunt uses a configuration-over-code approach, which can make it easier to manage complex tasks but might be less flexible for some use cases.
Webpack is a static module bundler for modern JavaScript applications. While it is primarily used for bundling JavaScript files for usage in a browser, it can also be configured to manage tasks similar to Jake. Webpack is more focused on the development of web applications and offers a rich plugin ecosystem.
npm install -g jake
Note that Jake is a system-level tool, and wants to be installed globally.
Prerequisites: Jake requires Node.js, and the utilities and minimatch modules.
Get Jake:
git clone git://github.com/mde/jake.git
Build Jake:
cd jake && make && sudo make install
Even if you're installing Jake from source, you'll still need NPM for installing
the few modules Jake depends on. make install will do this automatically for
you.
By default Jake is installed in "/usr/local." To install it into a different
directory (e.g., one that doesn't require super-user privilege), pass the PREFIX
variable to the make install command. For example, to install it into a
"jake" directory in your home directory, you could use this:
make && make install PREFIX=~/jake
If do you install Jake somewhere special, you'll need to add the "bin" directory
in the install target to your PATH to get access to the jake executable.
For Windows users installing from source, there are some additional steps.
Assumed: current directory is the same directory where node.exe is present.
Get Jake:
git clone git://github.com/mde/jake.git node_modules/jake
Copy jake.bat and jake to the same directory as node.exe
copy node_modules/jake/jake.bat jake.bat
copy node_modules/jake/jake jake
Add the directory of node.exe to the environment PATH variable.
jake [options ...] [env variables ...] target
Jake is a simple JavaScript build program with capabilities similar to the
regular make or rake command.
Jake has the following features:
* Jakefiles are in standard JavaScript syntax
* Tasks with prerequisites
* Namespaces for tasks
* Async task execution
-V/v
--version Display the Jake version.
-h
--help Display help message.
-f *FILE*
--jakefile *FILE* Use FILE as the Jakefile.
-C *DIRECTORY*
--directory *DIRECTORY* Change to DIRECTORY before running tasks.
-q
--quiet Do not log messages to standard output.
-J *JAKELIBDIR*
--jakelibdir *JAKELIBDIR* Auto-import any .jake files in JAKELIBDIR.
(default is 'jakelib')
-B
--always-make Unconditionally make all targets.
-t
--trace Enable full backtrace.
-T/ls
--tasks Display the tasks (matching optional PATTERN)
with descriptions, then exit.
A Jakefile is just executable JavaScript. You can include whatever JavaScript you want in it.
API docs can be found here.
Use task to define tasks. It has one required argument, the task-name, and
three optional arguments:
task(name, [prerequisites], [action], [opts]);
The name argument is a String with the name of the task, and prerequisites
is an optional Array arg of the list of prerequisite tasks to perform first.
The action is a Function defininng the action to take for the task. (Note that
Object-literal syntax for name/prerequisites in a single argument a la Rake is
also supported, but JavaScript's lack of support for dynamic keys in Object
literals makes it not very useful.) The action is invoked with the Task object
itself as the execution context (i.e, "this" inside the action references the
Task object).
The opts argument is the normal JavaScript-style 'options' object. When a
task's operations are asynchronous, the async property should be set to
true, and the task must call complete() to signal to Jake that the task is
done, and execution can proceed. By default the async property is false.
Tasks created with task are always executed when asked for (or are a
prerequisite). Tasks created with file are only executed if no file with the
given name exists or if any of its file-prerequisites are more recent than the
file named by the task. Also, if any prerequisite is a regular task, the file
task will always be executed.
Use desc to add a string description of the task.
Here's an example:
desc('This is the default task.');
task('default', function (params) {
console.log('This is the default task.');
});
desc('This task has prerequisites.');
task('hasPrereqs', ['foo', 'bar', 'baz'], function (params) {
console.log('Ran some prereqs first.');
});
And here's an example of an asynchronous task:
desc('This is an asynchronous task.');
task('asyncTask', {async: true}, function () {
setTimeout(complete, 1000);
});
A Task is also an EventEmitter which emits the 'complete' event when it is
finished. This allows asynchronous tasks to be run from within other asked via
either invoke or execute, and ensure they will complete before the rest of
the containing task executes. See the section "Running tasks from within other
tasks," below.
Create a file-task by calling file.
File-tasks create a file from one or more other files. With a file-task, Jake checks both that the file exists, and also that it is not older than the files specified by any prerequisite tasks. File-tasks are particularly useful for compiling something from a tree of source files.
desc('This builds a minified JS file for production.');
file('foo-minified.js', ['bar', 'foo-bar.js', 'foo-baz.js'], function () {
// Code to concat and minify goes here
});
Create a directory-task by calling directory.
Directory-tasks create a directory for use with for file-tasks. Jake checks for the existence of the directory, and only creates it if needed.
desc('This creates the bar directory for use with the foo-minified.js file-task.');
directory('bar');
This task will create the directory when used as a prerequisite for a file-task, or when run from the command-line.
Use namespace to create a namespace of tasks to perform. Call it with two arguments:
namespace(name, namespaceTasks);
Where is name is the name of the namespace, and namespaceTasks is a function
with calls inside it to task or desc definining all the tasks for that
namespace.
Here's an example:
desc('This is the default task.');
task('default', function () {
console.log('This is the default task.');
});
namespace('foo', function () {
desc('This the foo:bar task');
task('bar', function () {
console.log('doing foo:bar task');
});
desc('This the foo:baz task');
task('baz', ['default', 'foo:bar'], function () {
console.log('doing foo:baz task');
});
});
In this example, the foo:baz task depends on the the default and foo:bar tasks.
Parameters can be passed to Jake two ways: plain arguments, and environment variables.
To pass positional arguments to the Jake tasks, enclose them in square braces, separated by commas, after the name of the task on the command-line. For example, with the following Jakefile:
desc('This is an awesome task.');
task('awesome', function (a, b, c) {
console.log(a, b, c);
});
You could run jake like this:
jake awesome[foo,bar,baz]
And you'd get the following output:
foo bar baz
Note that you cannot uses spaces between the commas separating the parameters.
Any parameters passed after the Jake task that contain an equals sign (=) will be added to process.env.
With the following Jakefile:
desc('This is an awesome task.');
task('awesome', function (a, b, c) {
console.log(a, b, c);
console.log(process.env.qux, process.env.frang);
});
You could run jake like this:
jake awesome[foo,bar,baz] qux=zoobie frang=asdf
And you'd get the following output:
foo bar baz
zoobie asdf
Running jake with no arguments runs the default task.
Note for zsh users : you will need to escape the brackets or wrap in single quotes like this to pass parameters :
jake 'awesome[foo,bar,baz]'
An other solution is to desactivate permannently file-globbing for the jake
command. You can do this by adding this line to your .zshrc file :
alias jake="noglob jake"
The base 'jake' object is an EventEmitter, and fires a 'complete' event after running all tasks.
This is sometimes useful when a task starts a process which keeps the Node event-loop running (e.g., a database connection). If you know you want to stop the running Node process after all tasks have finished, you can set a listener for the 'complete' event, like so:
jake.addListener('complete', function () {
process.exit();
});
Jake supports the ability to run a task from within another task via the
invoke and execute methods.
The invoke method will run the desired task, along with its prerequisites:
desc('Calls the foo:bar task and its prerequisites.');
task('invokeFooBar', function () {
// Calls foo:bar and its prereqs
jake.Task['foo:bar'].invoke();
});
The invoke method will only run the task once, even if you call it repeatedly.
desc('Calls the foo:bar task and its prerequisites.');
task('invokeFooBar', function () {
// Calls foo:bar and its prereqs
jake.Task['foo:bar'].invoke();
// Does nothing
jake.Task['foo:bar'].invoke();
});
The execute method will run the desired task without its prerequisites:
desc('Calls the foo:bar task without its prerequisites.');
task('executeFooBar', function () {
// Calls foo:bar without its prereqs
jake.Task['foo:baz'].execute();
});
Calling execute repeatedly will run the desired task repeatedly.
desc('Calls the foo:bar task without its prerequisites.');
task('executeFooBar', function () {
// Calls foo:bar without its prereqs
jake.Task['foo:baz'].execute();
// Can keep running this over and over
jake.Task['foo:baz'].execute();
jake.Task['foo:baz'].execute();
});
If you want to run the task and its prerequisites more than once, you can use
invoke with the reenable method.
desc('Calls the foo:bar task and its prerequisites.');
task('invokeFooBar', function () {
// Calls foo:bar and its prereqs
jake.Task['foo:bar'].invoke();
// Does nothing
jake.Task['foo:bar'].invoke();
// Only re-runs foo:bar, but not its prerequisites
jake.Task['foo:bar'].reenable();
jake.Task['foo:bar'].invoke();
});
The reenable method takes a single Boolean arg, a 'deep' flag, which reenables
the task's prerequisites if set to true.
desc('Calls the foo:bar task and its prerequisites.');
task('invokeFooBar', function () {
// Calls foo:bar and its prereqs
jake.Task['foo:bar'].invoke();
// Does nothing
jake.Task['foo:bar'].invoke();
// Only re-runs foo:bar, but not its prerequisites
jake.Task['foo:bar'].reenable(true);
jake.Task['foo:bar'].invoke();
});
It's easy to pass params on to a sub-task run via invoke or execute:
desc('Passes params on to other tasks.');
task('passParams', function () {
var t = jake.Task['foo:bar'];
// Calls foo:bar, passing along current args
t.invoke.apply(t, arguments);
});
Tasks are EventEmitters. They can fire 'complete' and 'error' events.
If a task called via invoke is asynchronous, you can set a listener on the
'complete' event to run any code that depends on it.
desc('Calls the async foo:baz task and its prerequisites.');
task('invokeFooBaz', {async: true}, function () {
var t = jake.Task['foo:baz'];
t.addListener('complete', function () {
console.log('Finished executing foo:baz');
// Maybe run some other code
// ...
// Complete the containing task
complete();
});
// Kick off foo:baz
t.invoke();
});
If you want to handle the errors in a task in some specific way, you can set a listener for the 'error' event, like so:
namespace('vronk', function () {
task('groo', function () {
var t = jake.Task['vronk:zong'];
t.addListener('error', function (e) {
console.log(e.message);
});
t.invoke();
});
task('zong', function () {
throw new Error('OMFGZONG');
});
});
If no specific listener is set for the "error" event, errors are handled by Jake's generic error-handling.
You can abort a task by calling the fail function, and Jake will abort the
currently running task. You can pass a customized error message to fail:
desc('This task fails.');
task('failTask', function () {
fail('Yikes. Something back happened.');
});
You can also pass an optional exit status-code to the fail command, like so:
desc('This task fails with an exit-status of 42.');
task('failTaskQuestionCustomStatus', function () {
fail('What is the answer?', 42);
});
The process will exit with a status of 42.
Uncaught errors will also abort the currently running task.
Passing jake the -T or --tasks flag will display the full list of tasks
available in a Jakefile, along with their descriptions:
$ jake -T
jake default # This is the default task.
jake asdf # This is the asdf task.
jake concat.txt # File task, concating two files together
jake failure # Failing task.
jake lookup # Jake task lookup by name.
jake foo:bar # This the foo:bar task
jake foo:fonebone # This the foo:fonebone task
Setting a value for -T/--tasks will filter the list by that value:
$ jake -T foo
jake foo:bar # This the foo:bar task
jake foo:fonebone # This the foo:fonebone task
The list displayed will be all tasks whose namespace/name contain the filter-string.
Jake will automatically look for files with a .jake extension in a 'jakelib'
directory in your project, and load them (via require) after loading your
Jakefile. (The directory name can be overridden using the -J/--jakelibdir
command-line option.)
This allows you to break your tasks up over multiple files -- a good way to do
it is one namespace per file: e.g., a zardoz namespace full of tasks in
'jakelib/zardox.jake'.
Note that these .jake files each run in their own module-context, so they don't have access to each others' data. However, the Jake API methods, and the task-hierarchy are globally available, so you can use tasks in any file as prerequisites for tasks in any other, just as if everything were in a single file.
Environment-variables set on the command-line are likewise also naturally available to code in all files via process.env.
Since shelling out in Node is an asynchronous operation, Jake comes with a few useful file-utilities with a synchronous API, that make scripting easier.
The jake.mkdirP utility recursively creates a set of nested directories. It
will not throw an error if any of the directories already exists. Here's an example:
jake.mkdirP('app/views/layouts');
The jake.cpR utility does a recursive copy of a file or directory. It takes
two arguments, the file/directory to copy, and the destination. Note that this
command can only copy files and directories; it does not perform globbing (so
arguments like '*.txt' are not possible).
jake.cpR(path.join(sourceDir, '/templates'), currentDir);
This would copy 'templates' (and all its contents) into currentDir.
The jake.readdirR utility gives you a recursive directory listing, giving you
output somewhat similar to the Unix find command. It only works with a
directory name, and does not perform filtering or globbing.
jake.readdirR('pkg');
This would return an array of filepaths for all files in the 'pkg' directory, and all its subdirectories.
The jake.rmRf utility recursively removes a directory and all its contents.
jake.rmRf('pkg');
This would remove the 'pkg' directory, and all its contents.
jake.exec and jake.createExecJake also provides a more general utility function for running a sequence of shell-commands.
jake.execThe jake.exec command takes an array of shell-command strings, and an optional
callback to run after completing them. Here's an example from Jake's Jakefile,
that runs the tests:
desc('Runs the Jake tests.');
task('test', {async: true}, function () {
var cmds = [
'node ./tests/parseargs.js'
, 'node ./tests/task_base.js'
, 'node ./tests/file_task.js'
];
jake.exec(cmds, function () {
console.log('All tests passed.');
complete();
}, {printStdout: true});
});
It also takes an optional options-object, with the following options:
printStdout (print to stdout, default false)
printStderr (print to stderr, default false)
breakOnError (stop execution on error, default true)
This command doesn't pipe input between commands -- it's for simple execution.
jake.createExec and the evented Exec objectJake also provides an evented interface for running shell commands. Calling
jake.createExec returns an instance of jake.Exec, which is an EventEmitter
that fires events as it executes commands.
It emits the following events:
'cmdStart': When a new command begins to run. Passes one arg, the command being run.
'cmdEnd': When a command finishes. Passes one arg, the command being run.
'stdout': When the stdout for the child-process recieves data. This streams the stdout data. Passes one arg, the chunk of data.
'stderr': When the stderr for the child-process recieves data. This streams the stderr data. Passes one arg, the chunk of data.
'error': When a shell-command exits with a non-zero status-code. Passes two
args -- the error message, and the status code. If you do not set an error
handler, and a command exits with an error-code, Jake will throw the unhandled
error. If breakOnError is set to true, the Exec object will emit and 'error'
event after the first error, and stop any further execution.
To begin running the commands, you have to call the run method on it. It also
has an append method for adding new commands to the list of commands to run.
Here's an example:
var ex = jake.createExec(['do_thing.sh'], {printStdout: true});
ex.addListener('error', function (msg, code) {
if (code == 127) {
console.log("Couldn't find do_thing script, trying do_other_thing");
ex.append('do_other_thing.sh');
}
else {
fail('Fatal error: ' + msg, code);
}
});
ex.run();
Using the evented Exec object gives you a lot more flexibility in running shell commmands. But if you need something more sophisticated, Procstreams (https://github.com/polotek/procstreams) might be a good option.
Using the -q/--quiet flag at the command-line will stop Jake from sending its normal output to standard output. Note that this only applies to built-in output from Jake; anything you output normally from your tasks will still be displayed.
If you want to take advantage of the -q/--quiet flag in your own programs, you
can use jake.logger.log and jake.logger.error for displaying output. These
two commands will respect the flag, and suppress output correctly when the
quiet-flag is on.
You can check the current value of this flag in your own tasks by using
jake.program.opts.quiet. If you want the output of a jake.exec shell-command
to respect the quiet-flag, set your printStdout and printStderr options to
false if the quiet-option is on:
task('echo', {async: true}, function () {
jake.exec(['echo "hello"'], function () {
jake.logger.log('Done.');
complete();
}, {printStdout: !jake.program.opts.quiet});
});
Instantiating a PackageTask programmically creates a set of tasks for packaging up your project for distribution. Here's an example:
var t = new jake.PackageTask('fonebone', 'v0.1.2112', function () {
var fileList = [
'Jakefile'
, 'README.md'
, 'package.json'
, 'lib/*'
, 'bin/*'
, 'tests/*'
];
this.packageFiles.include(fileList);
this.needTarGz = true;
this.needTarBz2 = true;
});
This will automatically create a 'package' task that will assemble the specified
files in 'pkg/fonebone-v0.1.2112,' and compress them according to the specified
options. After running jake package, you'll have the following in pkg/:
fonebone-v0.1.2112
fonebone-v0.1.2112.tar.bz2
fonebone-v0.1.2112.tar.gz
PackageTask also creates a 'clobber' task that removes the pkg/ directory.
The PackageTask API docs include a lot more information, including different archiving options.
Jake's FileList takes a list of glob-patterns and file-names, and lazy-creates a list of files to include. Instead of immediately searching the filesystem to find the files, a FileList holds the pattern until it is actually used.
When any of the normal JavaScript Array methods (or the toArray method) are
called on the FileList, the pending patterns are resolved into an actual list of
file-names. FileList uses the minimatch module.
To build the list of files, use FileList's include and exclude methods:
var list = new jake.FileList();
list.include('foo/*.txt');
list.include(['bar/*.txt', 'README.md']);
list.include('Makefile', 'package.json');
list.exclude('foo/zoobie.txt');
list.exclude(/foo\/src.*.txt/);
console.log(list.toArray());
The include method can be called either with an array of items, or multiple
single parameters. Items can be either glob-patterns, or individual file-names.
The exclude method will prevent files from being included in the list. These
files must resolve to actual files on the filesystem. It can be called either
with an array of items, or mutliple single parameters. Items can be
glob-patterns, individual file-names, string-representations of
regular-expressions, or regular-expression literals.
Instantiating a TestTask programmically creates a simple task for running tests for your project. The first argument of the constructor is the project-name (used in the description of the task), and the second argument is a function that defines the task. It allows you to specifify what files to run as tests, and what to name the task that gets created (defaults to "test" if unset).
var t = new jake.TestTask('fonebone', function () {
var fileList = [
'tests/*'
, 'lib/adapters/**/test.js'
];
this.testFiles.include(fileList);
this.testFiles.exclude('tests/helper.js');
this.testName = 'testMainAndAdapters';
});
Tests in the specified file should be in the very simple format of test-functions hung off the export. These tests are converted into Jake tasks which Jake then runs normally.
If a test needs to run asynchronously, simply define the test-function with a single argument, a callback. Jake will define this as an asynchronous task, and will wait until the callback is called in the test function to run the next test.
Here's an example test-file:
var assert = require('assert')
, tests;
tests = {
'sync test': function () {
// Assert something
assert.ok(true);
}
, 'async test': function (next) {
// Assert something else
assert.ok(true);
// Won't go next until this is called
next();
}
, 'another sync test': function () {
// Assert something else
assert.ok(true);
}
};
module.exports = tests;
Jake's tests are also a good example of use of a TestTask.
The NpmPublishTask builds on top of PackageTask to allow you to do a version bump of your project, package it, and publish it to NPM. Define the task with your project's name, and the list of files you want packaged and published to NPM.
Here's an example from Jake's Jakefile:
var p = new jake.NpmPublishTask('jake', [
'Makefile'
, 'Jakefile'
, 'README.md'
, 'package.json'
, 'lib/*'
, 'bin/*'
, 'tests/*'
]);
The NpmPublishTask will automatically create a publish task which performs the
following steps:
Jake can also handle Jakefiles in CoffeeScript. Be sure to make it Jakefile.coffee so Jake knows it's in CoffeeScript.
Here's an example:
util = require('util')
desc 'This is the default task.'
task 'default', (params) ->
console.log 'Ths is the default task.'
console.log(util.inspect(arguments))
jake.Task['new'].invoke []
task 'new', ->
console.log 'ello from new'
jake.Task['foo:next'].invoke ['param']
namespace 'foo', ->
task 'next', (param) ->
console.log 'ello from next with param: ' + param
James Coglan's "Jake": http://github.com/jcoglan/jake
Confusingly, this is a Ruby tool for building JavaScript packages from source code.
280 North's Jake: http://github.com/280north/jake
This is also a JavaScript port of Rake, which runs on the Narwhal platform.
Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0)
FAQs
JavaScript build tool, similar to Make or Rake
The npm package jake receives a total of 13,962,438 weekly downloads. As such, jake popularity was classified as popular.
We found that jake demonstrated a healthy version release cadence and project activity because the last version was released less than a year ago. It has 4 open source maintainers collaborating on the project.
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