Hexmake

Hexmake is a small build tool that provides good caching behavior and then gets out of the way. It is organized like Make, but with a variety of small improvements:

• Process whole directory trees as inputs, not just individual files.
• Support .gitignore when doing so.
• When deciding whether to rebuild, use the contents of the files rather than their timestamps.
• Also include the command line and environment variables as inputs.
• Always put build outputs into an out directory rather than ever putting them back in the source trees.
• Use your favorite scripting language for templating rather the tool having its own.

Compared to Nix, which is otherwise a masterpiece:

• Do not recompile Firefox from source code. Use the system libraries and tools the way they already exist on the system rather than control them with the build tool. The idea is that a developer gets a better experience when their different tools all integrate with each other. Bringing that idea to the build system, it is preferable if the build system uses the same compilers and other tools that the developer is already using, and likewise, it is better if the outputs of the build system are ready to be used by the developer and do not need some special side environment to be run.

I hope you enjoy Hexmake! Tell me about your experiments if you try it out.