[erlang-questions] Build tools

[Zachary Kessin]

it is a good thing for all of us that the Erlang eco system is growing! 
The problem is that this means that we have more and more options for 
building packages. As an application developer If I find a package I 
want to use that is written in LFE or Elixir (or whatever new beam 
language comes out in 2016) I would like to be able to use it without 
having to figure out a new tool.

Since we don't want 1 tool to know how to build everything because that 
turns into a nighmare for whomever has to maintain that tool what we 
should have is a standard way for a tool to look at a directory and know 
how to build it. That way Mix and Rebar (and any other tool) can simply 
delegate out building to the correct tool.

If a tool find a package that it does not otherwise know how to build it 
should have some standard way to invoke a build

I see that there are a few options for this

1) Use a makefile, even if it is a very simple makefile that simply has 
an "all" target that calls mix or rebar
2) have a standard script say ".erl_build" which can be a bash script 
that will invoke the actual build tool

Mostly I want this to be simple for both package maintainers, and for 
tool builders.

--Zach