Describe the next rake task.

Example:

  desc "Run the Unit Tests"
  task :test => [:build]
    runtests
  end

Declare a set of files tasks to create the given directories on demand.

Example:

  directory "testdata/doc"

Declare a file task.

Example:

  file "config.cfg" => ["config.template"] do
    open("config.cfg", "w") do |outfile|
      open("config.template") do |infile|
        while line = infile.gets
          outfile.puts line
        end
      end
    end
 end

Declare a file creation task. (Mainly used for the directory command).

Import the partial Rakefiles fn. Imported files are loaded after the current file is completely loaded. This allows the import statement to appear anywhere in the importing file, and yet allowing the imported files to depend on objects defined in the importing file.

A common use of the import statement is to include files containing dependency declarations.

See also the —rakelibdir command line option.

Example:

  import ".depend", "my_rules"

Declare a task that performs its prerequisites in parallel. Multitasks does not guarantee that its prerequisites will execute in any given order (which is obvious when you think about it)

Example:

  multitask :deploy => [:deploy_gem, :deploy_rdoc]

Create a new rake namespace and use it for evaluating the given block. Returns a NameSpace object that can be used to lookup tasks defined in the namespace.

E.g.

  ns = namespace "nested" do
    task :run
  end
  task_run = ns[:run] # find :run in the given namespace.

Declare a rule for auto-tasks.

Example:

 rule '.o' => '.c' do |t|
   sh %{cc -o #{t.name} #{t.source}}
 end

Declare a basic task.

Example:

  task :clobber => [:clean] do
    rm_rf "html"
  end