WAwaruqi·Nov 30, 2020
I prefer xmake
https://github.com/xmake-io/xmake
In Please – A cross-language build systemxmake-io
xmake
Lua2017–2026
xmake-io / xmake
xmake
🔥 A cross-platform build utility based on Lua
16Distinct people
59Mentions
0Explicit recommenders
12.3KGitHub stars
What to know before exploring
What it is
🔥 A cross-platform build utility based on Lua
GitHub
Where it is used
No documented product use was verified in the last source check.
What people are saying
No recommendation phrase was found in the indexed comments.
No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.
Also in these discussions
No other repository is repeatedly linked in the same discussions.
This week on Hacker News
Nov 8–Nov 15 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/15/2026, 4:00:59 PM UTC.
No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.
Mentions over time
HN mentions by year59 dated mentions
Observed mentions: 2017-01-15 12:14:39 UTC to 2026-04-09 17:12:18 UTC.
* An incomplete calendar period is marked with an outlined bar. Its count is not directly comparable with a full period.
Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.
View mention counts and date ranges
| Period | Start (UTC) | End (exclusive, UTC) | Mentions | Submissions | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | 2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 7 | 5 | 2 |
| 2018 | 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 6 | 6 | 0 |
| 2019 | 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2 | 1 | 1 |
| 2020 | 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 11 | 8 | 3 |
| 2021 | 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 8 | 7 | 1 |
| 2022 | 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 15 | 5 | 10 |
| 2023 | 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2 | 1 | 1 |
| 2024 | 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 3 | 1 | 2 |
| 2025 | 2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| 2026 (partial) | 2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2027-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 3 | 0 | 3 |
What Hacker News says
11 sourcesXmake v2.3.9 released, Improve C/C++ package manager
2 points · Open discussionXmake v2.3.8 Released, Add Intel C++/Fortran Compiler Support
1 points · Open discussionXmake v2.3.7 released, Add tinyc and emscripten toolchains
1 points · Open discussionShow HN: A cross-platform c/c++ build utility based on Lua
10 points · Open discussionXmake v2.3.6 released, Support Fortran compilation and go/dlang packages
8 points · Open discussionXmake v2.3.5 released, Multi toolchain flexible switching support
2 points · Open discussionXmake v2.3.4 released, Better toolchain support
2 points · Open discussionThe visual configuration menu used in xmake is ltui.
xmake f --menu
https://github.com/tboox/xmake
In LTUI – A cross platform terminal UI library based on LuaXmake v2.3.2 released, Build as fast as ninja
9 points · Open discussionI believe xmake doesn't "require" Lua. Instead, xmake embeds Lua. Specifically it embeds LuaJIT 2.1, based on what I could tell in their repo source. So, when you run xmake, you're actually running a a full-blown Lua implementation that is self-contained in the xmake binary, that has some automatic imports for the xmake embedded build DSL. If you want to run arbitrary Lua using xmake, there is a built-in "lua" plugin, shorthand "xmake l", described here:
https://github.com/xmake-io/xmake/blob/master/README.md#run-...
So, it would be a bit like if you built a build language atop Python, but rather than depending on Python, you made your whole build tool embed the entire CPython interpreter, pinned to some version. Lua is used in this way more commonly than Python is, of course.
So: xmake itself is just a C program with large submodules wri
Read the rest
tten in Lua, running inside that embedded Lua context. The upside here is that xmake's releases are just plain platform-specific native binaries that bundle everything you need, and that make no assumptions about your base system. This is a nice benefit in a build tool, as it aids in reproducible builds.