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Quick Overview
Dune is a build system for OCaml and Reason projects. It is designed to be fast, reliable, and easy to use, providing a consistent and scalable build process for both small and large-scale projects.
Pros
- Simplicity: Dune provides a straightforward and intuitive build configuration, making it easy for developers to set up and manage their projects.
- Performance: Dune is optimized for speed, with parallel builds and incremental compilation, resulting in faster build times.
- Scalability: Dune can handle large and complex projects, with support for multiple packages and dependencies within a single repository.
- Ecosystem Integration: Dune integrates well with the broader OCaml ecosystem, including tools like opam and merlin.
Cons
- Learning Curve: While Dune is relatively simple to use, it may have a steeper learning curve for developers new to the OCaml ecosystem.
- Limited Flexibility: Dune's opinionated approach to build configuration may not suit all project needs, and some developers may prefer more control over the build process.
- Dependency on OCaml: Dune is tightly coupled with the OCaml language and ecosystem, which may limit its usefulness for projects in other programming languages.
- Lack of Windows Support: Dune's primary focus is on Unix-based systems, and its support for Windows is limited.
Code Examples
Not applicable, as Dune is a build system and not a code library.
Getting Started
To get started with Dune, follow these steps:
-
Install Dune:
opam install dune -
Create a new Dune project:
dune init project my-project -
Add your source files to the
src/directory and define your build rules in thedunefile:(executable (name main) (libraries base)) -
Build your project:
dune build -
Run your executable:
dune exec ./main.exe
Dune also supports various other features, such as multi-package projects, foreign function interfaces, and more. You can find detailed documentation on the Dune website.
Competitor Comparisons
ReScript is a robustly typed language that compiles to efficient and human-readable JavaScript.
Pros of ReScript
- Designed for JavaScript interoperability, making it easier to integrate with existing JS ecosystems
- Simpler syntax compared to OCaml, with a focus on readability and ease of use
- Built-in JSX support for React development
Cons of ReScript
- Smaller community and ecosystem compared to OCaml and Dune
- Limited to JavaScript as the primary compilation target
- Less flexible for non-web development use cases
Code Comparison
ReScript:
let greeting = (name) => {
`Hello, ${name}!`
}
Console.log(greeting("World"))
Dune (OCaml):
let greeting name =
Printf.sprintf "Hello, %s!" name
let () =
print_endline (greeting "World")
Summary
ReScript is tailored for web development with JavaScript interoperability, offering a simpler syntax and built-in JSX support. Dune, as part of the OCaml ecosystem, provides a more versatile build system for OCaml projects with broader application domains. ReScript's focus on JavaScript limits its use cases, while Dune benefits from OCaml's wider ecosystem and language features. The code comparison illustrates ReScript's JavaScript-like syntax versus OCaml's more traditional functional programming style.
The core OCaml system: compilers, runtime system, base libraries
Pros of ocaml/ocaml
- The OCaml compiler is the core of the OCaml ecosystem, providing a robust and well-optimized implementation of the OCaml language.
- The compiler is actively maintained and regularly updated, ensuring compatibility with the latest language features and improvements.
- The OCaml compiler is highly configurable, allowing users to customize the compilation process to suit their specific needs.
Cons of ocaml/ocaml
- The OCaml compiler is a complex and low-level tool, which can make it challenging for beginners to use and understand.
- The compiler's focus on performance and optimization can sometimes come at the expense of ease of use and developer productivity.
<code_comparison>
(* ocaml/ocaml *)
let rec fib n =
if n <= 1 then n
else fib (n-1) + fib (n-2)
(* ocaml/dune *)
let rec fib n =
if n <= 1 then n
else fib (n-1) + fib (n-2)
The code snippets for both ocaml/ocaml and ocaml/dune are identical, as Dune is a build system for OCaml projects and does not directly affect the implementation of OCaml code.
</code_comparison>
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A Composable Build System for OCaml
Dune is a build system for OCaml. It provides a consistent experience and takes care of the low-level details of OCaml compilation. You need only to provide a description of your project, and Dune will do the rest.
Dune implements a scheme that's inspired from the one used inside Jane Street and adapted to the open source world. It has matured over a long time and is used daily by hundreds of developers, meaning it's highly tested and productive.
Dune comes with a manual. If you want to get started without reading too much, look at the quick start guide or watch this introduction video.
The example directory contains examples of projects using Dune.
How does it work?
Dune reads project metadata from dune files, which are static files with a
simple S-expression syntax. It uses this information to setup build rules,
generate configuration files for development tools such as Merlin,
handle installation, etc.
Dune itself is fast, has very little overhead, and supports parallel builds on all platforms. It has no system dependencies. OCaml is all you need to build Dune and packages using Dune.
In particular, one can install OCaml on Windows with a binary installer and then use only the Windows Console to build Dune and packages using Dune.
Strengths
Composable
Dune is composable, meaning that multiple Dune projects can be arranged together, leading to a single build that Dune knows how to execute. This allows for monorepos of projects.
Dune makes simultaneous development on multiple packages a trivial task.
Gracefully Handles Multi-Package Repositories
Dune knows how to handle repositories containing several packages. When building via opam, it is able to correctly use libraries that were previously installed, even if they are already present in the source tree.
The magic invocation is:
$ dune build --only-packages <package-name> @install
Build Against Several Configurations at Once
Dune can build a given source code repository against several configurations simultaneously. This helps maintaining packages across several versions of OCaml, as you can test them all at once without hassle.
In particular, this makes it easy to handle cross-compilation. This feature requires opam.
Installation
Requirements
Dune requires OCaml version 4.08.0 to build itself and can build OCaml projects using OCaml 4.02.3 or greater.
Installation
We recommended installing Dune via the opam package manager:
$ opam install dune
If you are new to opam, make sure to run eval $(opam config env) to make
dune available in your PATH. The dune binary is self-contained and
relocatable, so you can safely copy it somewhere else to make it permanently
available.
You can also build it manually with:
$ make release
$ make install
If you do not have make, you can do the following:
$ ocaml boot/bootstrap.ml
$ ./dune.exe build -p dune --profile dune-bootstrap
$ ./dune.exe install dune
The first command builds the dune.exe binary. The second builds the additional
files installed by Dune, such as the man pages, and the last simply installs
all of that on the system.
Please note: unless you ran the optional ./configure script, you can
simply copy dune.exe anywhere and it will just work. dune is fully
relocatable and discovers its environment at runtime rather than hard-coding it
at compilation time.
Support
If you have questions or issues about Dune, you can ask in our GitHub discussions page or open a ticket on GitHub.
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