Shake is an open-source build system, which can also be understood as a Haskell library for writing build systems, aiming to replace tools like make, Scons, and Ant. It is more suitable for projects that cannot directly use off-the-shelf build solutions like Visual Studio or cabal, and whose complexity exceeds that of an ordinary Makefile. The text emphasizes that it has been used commercially for over five years and has been adopted by projects or organizations such as Standard Chartered, GHC Hadrian, and ghcide.
Shake's key differentiator lies in its dependency model: it supports discovering additional dependencies after prerequisite rules have run, making it suitable for scenarios where dependencies are analyzed after file generation. It also supports dependencies beyond files, such as environment variables, file existence, directory contents, compiler versions, or remote information. In terms of performance, it is optimized for "unchanged rebuilds," supporting parallel builds and resource constraints to avoid triggering downstream rebuilds when a dependency is rebuilt but its content remains unchanged. Observability is also robust, offering estimated completion times, profiling HTML reports, lint, and sanity checks.
In terms of ecosystem, Shake can execute Ninja files, allowing for indirect integration with CMake and Meson. Extension libraries cover Path/ReaderT/Text wrappers, C/C++/Objective-C cross-compilation, C++ rules, AVR, CSS/JS minification, static site generation, bioinformatics pipelines, and more. Although build scripts are Haskell programs, the official documentation states that deep Haskell knowledge is not required, and they can be used using "Shake syntax".
Shake is open-source under the BSD license and hosted on GitHub; the text mentions no commercial version or paid plans. The documentation quality is quite good: it includes a user manual, FAQ, API documentation, function search, debugging, performance optimization, command-line arguments, Ninja, Lint, developer documentation, as well as papers, videos, and blogs. The installation path is also clear: after installing Haskell Stack, execute stack install shake, and then run the demo.
Pros include powerful dependency expression, suitability for large custom builds, fast incremental builds, robust parallel and profiling capabilities, and being open-source and auditable. The cons are also clear: scripts use Haskell syntax, so compiler errors may manifest as Haskell type errors; it is not typically installed by default like make; and it does not provide default build rules, which might make simple projects more cumbersome.
The text provides no information regarding access, mirrors, payments, or service availability in mainland China, so this is deemed unknown. Since it primarily relies on GitHub, the Stack/Haskell ecosystem, and local installation, domestic teams should verify network access to GitHub, package download sources, and CI environments in advance. If the network or the team's language stack is not a good fit, alternatives like Make, Ninja, CMake, Meson, or Scons can be evaluated.
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