The Old Joel on Software Forum: Part 4 (of 5) - Alternatives to Incredibuild.

Alternatives to Incredibuild.

We are looking at getting a distributed build system set up for Visual C++: Incredibuild has been mentioned as a possibility before on this forum.

I'd like to look at other alternatives before making a case to purchase it, however.

Does anybody know of any comparable products?

Any experiences of using them, good or bad?

Whatever it is, it would have to run on Windows NT/2000/XP and support Visual C++ v6 as well as v7.1.

Yes, that's *really* Visual C++ v6: let your silence be eloquent enough. ;-)

Thanks in advance.

Gerard
Tuesday, March 2, 2004

Where I work, people here love it. But we don't like that it only supports distributed builds for Win32 & X-Box targets (I presume your build target is Win32).

And there just aren't any comparable products that I am aware of. We use .NET exclusively now, but we used to use VC6 with an older version of IncrediBuild; I assume VC6 still supported (Xoreax says it is).

Immature programmer
Tuesday, March 2, 2004

http://distcc.samba.org/ ?

I believe as it stands it will only work with gcc (I could be wrong), but then again since it is Open Source perhaps you could hack it yourself until it works for the MS compiler as well.

Tuesday, March 2, 2004

Only other comerical product I know of is Clear Case using its built in omake system and at $6000 a seat and a months worth of make file writing, and a steep learning curve I would think long and hard before going that route.

A Software Build Guy
Tuesday, March 2, 2004

Also look at OpenMake at http://www.openmake.com/products.html They allow builds to be controled from a single consel system on multible systems. A little scripting and you have a distribted build. Both of my suggestion require more up front work then Incedibuild to get working but I believe it can be done.

A Software Build Guy
Tuesday, March 2, 2004

I thought that there's another product for VC6 but I can't find a link for it at the moment. I'll post it if I find it. The only other one that I know of is VS .NET only - JetBuild at http://www.jetfrog.com/

r1ch
Tuesday, March 2, 2004

Thanks for your replies, everybody.

rIch:

I'll wait for your post on that other product - we've had a look at JetBuild but as you point out, it's not for Visual C++ v6.

A Software Build Guy:

Yes, I've used Clearcase at several locations, but always on Unix systems. While I've been a big fan of Clearcase on Unix, I've always had my doubts about Clearcase on Windows. To be honest, I'd give it a try anyway, except I know the price is too high for us to consider.

Given the developments on the TLA/Arch front I'll be thinking of using that coupled with distcc for any future Unix / Linux work: but that's for another day.

A colleague of mine is trying to remember a distributed build system he's seen in the past for Windows - I'll post a link if he digs it out, should anybody else be looking.

Gerard
Wednesday, March 3, 2004

jetfrog? Is it crunchy?

Wednesday, March 3, 2004