Compile standalone binary

[abitrolly]

How to compile the project into a single binary that doesn't require Java o be installed?

[alexeagle]

@mikelalcon hi from Bazel maintainer - I trip over this at clients regularly. Forcing users to build your application from source is fraught with perils, such as polluting their @maven namespace with versions of libraries you use, requiring Java on their PATH when rules_jvm_external is non-hermetic, slower, harder to install, and more.

Would you be interested in a PR to add some automation here that publishes an uberjar for each release? If not I may create a separate repo in the spirit of https://github.com/aspect-build/bsdtar-prebuilt that publishes this, since I need it frequently.

[abitrolly]

@alexeagle I don't think any release related work is gonna happen - see this comment #273 (comment) from @hsudhof. So a separate repo looks like the only option.

[alexeagle]

Okay, that's not surprising, thanks for tracking that down. I agree that won't work - and Google Cloud Build is a non-starter since they won't give non-googlers access to needed bits.

[mikelalcon]

I think we should have some kind of release, but we cannot offer version compatibility for now.

I let @hsudhof decide if we do it.

[abitrolly]

@mikelalcon @hsudhof did you come to any conclusion? I think version compatibility is not needed at this point. For now monthly copybara:2025-01 and copybara:latest images would be enough for 100% of us. :D

[mikelalcon]

Let me ask internally how hard would be to put something together.

[mikelalcon]

@alexeagle how does #310 look ?