Remote repositories are the way to use dependencies from "outside" of the Bazel world in Bazel. Using them, you can download binaries from the internet or use some from your own host. You can even use Skylark to define your own repository rules to depend on a custom package manager or to implement auto-configuration rules.
As you might have seen either in our 0.4 announcement or simply by going to our website, we have recently switched over to the bazel.build domain name.
We are delighted to announce the 0.4.0 release of Bazel. This release marks major improvements in support for Windows, sandboxing and performance.
We've recently open-sourced Bazel plugins for IntelliJ and Android Studio.
We first announced experimental Windows support in 0.3.0. Since then, we've implemented support for building, running and testing C++, Java and Python, as well as improved performance and stability. Starting with Bazel version 0.3.2, we are making prebuilt Bazel Windows binaries available as part of our releases (installation instructions).
One of Bazel’s longest-standing feature requests is integration with IDEs. With the 0.3 release, we finally have all machinery in place that allows implementing integration with Bazel in IDEs. Simultaneous with that Bazel release we are also making public two IDE plugins:
We are delighted to announce the 0.3.0 release of Bazel. This milestone is marked by support for IDE integration but also major features such as remote caching of build artifacts and experimental Windows support.
Skylark remote repositories let you create custom external repositories using Skylark. This not only enables creating rules for custom package systems such as PyPi but also generating a repository to reflect the toolchain installed on the workstation Bazel is running on. We explain here how we implemented auto-configuration for the C++ toolchain.
We have often heard that debugging failed execution due to issues with the sandbox is difficult and requires knowledge of the sandboxing code of Bazel to actually understand what’s happening. With these changes, we hope that you will be able to solve common issues easier on your own and make debugging easier.
We are delighted to announce the 0.2.0 release of Bazel. This release marks major improvements in support for external repositories, Skylark and testing, in particular how external repositories and Skylark can work together.