I guess Ant doesn't work in Windows Millenium, because when I pull up a command prompt and try to run ant, it scrolls by a bunch of crap which is basically standard error output. Because it's Windows, command prompt doesn't have a scroll bar. Because it's standard error, I can't redirect the output to a file. Because -logfile doesn't print standard error, I can't use command line switches to save the output. Basically, unless Ant produces less than like 20 lines of output, or unless it starts printing output to standard output, or unless I find an alternative to dos command prompt that isn't a piece of shit, I can't use Ant on Windows. And I'm pissed because I just wasted 2 hours trying to find a way around this, searching google groups, downloading command prompt alternatives, and nothing f***ing works. You guys should really consider redoing the output of Ant so that it works under Windows if you want Windows users to use it, because not everyone has the latest and greatest windows with scrollbar support in command prompt. Windows f***ing sucks and if it wasn't for the project's need to work on Windows, I would have ditched it a long time ago. I can't believe how rediculous this is, a program that prints output that you can't read. Sorry for my frustration but it really, really, really really really pisses me off..
*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 13582 ***
How is this a duplicate? 13582 has to do with ant.bat checking for paths and whether or not files/directories exist under Windows 98. My bug has to do with not being able to see the output when I run ant because it scrolls down a ton of text using standard error, meaning that (1) I can't scroll back because Windows sucks, and (2) I can't redirect the stderr output to a file because windows sucks. I don't see what this has to do with 13582. I think it's a bug because Ant should provide a means for command output under Windows 95/98/Millenium, and scrolling a bunch of text down a command prompt window so you can't read it doesn't seem like the route to go.
You said: "I guess Ant doesn't work in Windows Millenium, because when I pull up a command prompt and try to run ant, it scrolls by a bunch of crap which is basically standard error output. " My assumption is that this results from the problem in ant.bat. If you make that fix, Ant should work. You should then be able to use -logfile. If this does not work for you, I apologize for the incorrect assumption As for Ant producing too much output for Windows ME, I'm afraid that is a limitation of Windows ME. There are many other limitations to Windows ME and it is not feasible for Ant to try and fix all of them. Some alternatives would be to install cygwin and use the rxvt terminal which comes with a scrollbar or to use an editor such as jEdit (free) or UltraEdit which can store the output into a window with a scroll bar.
Can you also try to capture the standard error output if you do : ant 2> myerrors.txt Another possibility would be that you install emacs or xemacs on your PC, then run ant from the shell buffer of emacs, which should be big enough and lets you scroll through the results. Other editors might also have big shell buffers. For instance UltraEdit32 can run commands for you and display both stderr and stdout in the resulting buffer.
I don't know WindowsME, but in Windows 95/98/NT/2000 (all of which I've used), it requires you set the vertical buffer to something larger than the screen height and scroll bars will then appear. I'm assuming WindowsME has the same feature.
Erik is right, you should be able to right click on the title bar of your DOS Command window, then a popup menu appears. If you choose from this menu "Properties", you can adjust the size of the window and more importantly the size of the buffer up to 9999 lines.
No, unfortunately in Windows 98 (and I suspect 95 and ME) it is not possible to have a scroll bar on a command window. You can set the window to a maximum of 50 lines.
Yes, I tried multiple options under properties, to no avail. I haven't tried redirecting stderr with 2>, so maybe I should give that a try. I thought that was a unix-only thing, although I did try >& (used in csh for stderr). Using UltraEdit32 or whatever sounds like a good idea too, I'll try that. I guess I've been working in unix for too long, so it's extremely painful to deal with Windows command-line after getting spoiled by all the features of unix. Thanks for the help, Dustin
I love titles that blame us, but I guess you are just venting your disatisfaction with WinME/ I agree the Windows command line sucks, and I agree we didnt take it into account. But we did and still do jump through inordinate hoops in the batch file to make sure that Ant runs under win9x, which is a lot harder than you think, as the .BAT execution sucks badly too. The rest, we leave to you Can I suggest. 1. ant | more to get paged stuff 2. 4DOS command shell (very nice add on) 3. run ant inside an IDE 4. antidote (feel free to help) Also, what was it you expected? That we should recognise that win9x and suddenly add a fancy gui with scroll bars just to make your life easier? But what about everyone running ant as part of some batch mode? -Steve
Nope, I wouldn't expect you to improve Windows or include an Ant-specific service pack for Windows with Ant, that's silly. But when your program doesn't work, or when a user cannot see output, I think you have a serious problem. Imagine if you wrote a Windows application that only ran at a resolution of 1280x1024 and announced to the world that anyone with Windows can run it! But when users downloaded it, some of them realized they couldn't run it because it was made to run at only 1280x1024. Well, I would say that's a serious flaw with your software, and unless there was a really good reason for forcing 1280x1024 resolution for your software, it's probably a dumb idea. Excuse the crappy analogy, but nonetheless, I think it applies. If you write an app for Windows but don't take into account the limitations of Windows, you're setting yourself and your users up for trouble. Trust me, I'm not trying to bash Ant, I know you guys wrote some code that I'm able to download for free and play with, so obviously if I don't like it, you have no obligation to support me. It was simply a recommendation, that if you're going to design a program for windows that's dependent on the evil MSDOS Command Prompt, then either adjust the output of Ant so that it accomodates this limitation, or provide some links or something to some software that will enable Ant to run a little more gracefully under Windows. In my case, I was running ant, but getting an error message that I couldn't understand because it was beyond the border of my command prompt. That's a serious problem for Windows users running Ant. In most cases piping output or doing |more will work, but in this case, it didn't. For whatever reason, I guess stderr doesn't pipe to the more command. So don't take it as me bashing your software, but instead read it as me making a recommendation as a frustrated user. I know Windows sucks for things like this, and it must be a real headache, I sympathize. But nothing would be better than to have Ant performing as the most robust build system on all platforms. Thanks again for all the recommendations, and continue the good work. -Dustin