Mason: A declarative build tool on top of Dagger

a year ago

Mason is a declarative build tool built on top of Dagger to simplify and scale its usage.
Dagger's current form poses challenges like boilerplate code and non-trivial CLI usage, making it hard to deploy at scale.
Mason aims for a simple, consistent CLI UX across projects, similar to Maven's 'mvn package' simplicity.
It provides a declarative configuration approach, inspired by GoReleaser and Kubernetes, for projects with similar needs but different parameters.
Mason leverages Dagger's Interactive Shell to generate scripts based on configuration files, simplifying module orchestration.
The tool introduces a two-phase plan/apply design: generating scripts in the first phase and executing them in the second.
Mason benefits from Dagger's built-in features like caching, plugin system via modules, sandboxed execution, and TUI.
Adopting Mason requires transitioning from local Dagger modules to YAML configs and consolidating CI calls, but retains Dagger's core functionalities.
In corporate settings, Mason simplifies project 'daggerization' with YAML files, offering maintainability and consistent developer UX across projects.
Future enhancements may include reporting features and deeper integration with Dagger, positioning Mason as a potential 'Docker Compose' for Dagger.

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