Convincing eclipse / GPE not to recompile the GWT code when I make a server-only change

Question

I work with GWT and GAE in Eclipse with google eclipse plugin. Sometimes I just want to make a quick server fix. I am changing something in my server code and redeploying it, but the GWT code is also recompiled. At the moment, it takes about 10 minutes and is a real drag when the client is waiting for a change.

Server code is not in the source path in my GWT modules. Does anyone have any ideas for convincing the GWT that no relevant changes have been made, and that it can skip the recompilation? Alternatively, I would be happy to simply manually force the GWT compiler to not start.

Answer 1

If you are using maven, set the gwt.compiler.skip property to true. If not, there should be a flag for any build setting that you use to make it skip when you know it’s not necessary (and if you can share how you build, you can probably offer more specific instructions).

It is very difficult for the compiler to determine that not a single code that can affect the client has changed, even if you do not change any client or common code. Generators and linkers are arbitrary java code that can call anything else in the classpath, and the compiler cannot guarantee that they will not call into your other classes (and in fact this can be a useful function, for example, for RequestFactory proxy checks).