Configurable builds, with multiple components

[Calum Maclean <ca...@aspects-sw.com>]

My company has a number of products, which we release in various
configurations, each of which contains an assortment of products.

I've 2 issues on which I would appreciate advice on the best way to solve.

Firstly, I'd like to use the same build files for each configuration, but
configure the process for each configuration as to what products etc. are
contained.  At the moment, I do this via property files, which define (or
leave out) a property for each product.  The corresponding tasks then only
run if that property is set.  Is there any better way to do this?

Secondly, as we're got various components, I'd like to put them in separate
build files.  But, can you express task dependencies between build files,
rather than within a build file?  At the moment, I'm not using dependencies,
but using the "ant" task to run the tasks I need from within the dependent
task.

I'm using an old version of Ant (1.2!), which didn't really support these
types of thing too well.  Does the latest version have better support?

Thanks,

Calum