Default task for namespace in Rake

Question

Given something like:

namespace :my_tasks do
  task :foo do
    do_something
  end

  task :bar do
    do_something_else
  end

  task :all => [:foo, :bar         


        

Answer 1

The way I'm reading obvio171's question is that he is asking¹⁾ for a systematic way to invoke a certain task in a namespace by invoking the namespace as a task.

I've frequently encountered the same need. I like to logically group tasks into namespaces. Often that grouping resembles a hierarchy. Hence the desire to invoke the group makes very much sense to me.

Here's my take:

module Rake::DSL
  def group(name, &block)
    ns = namespace name, &block
    default = ns[:default]
    task name => "#{name}:default" if default
    ns
  end
end

group :foo do
  task :foo1 do |t| puts t.name end
  task :foo2 do |t| puts t.name end
  task :default => [:foo1, :foo2]
end

task :default => :foo

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¹⁾...or was asking, years ago. Nonetheless a still interesting question.