• Explores the evolution of build tools from simple shell commands to modern sophisticated systems like Gradle and CMake
  • Demonstrates the fundamental difference between Java and C/C++ build approaches, with Java hiding many complexities that C developers had to manage manually
  • Illustrates how Make was created to solve compilation dependency problems through timestamp-based rebuilding
  • Shows how Java build tools like Ant, Maven, and Gradle introduced platform independence and dependency management
  • Highlights the importance of conventions in modern build tools, particularly in Java’s ecosystem
  • Explains how CMake provides an abstraction layer that generates complex makefiles automatically for C/C++ projects
  • Demonstrates the value of using simple tools like Make for straight forward tasks rather than over-engineering solutions
  • Covers how build tools evolved to handle package management, dependency resolution, and integration with IDEs