# Existing tooling As with any software project the first thing you should do is have a look at what pre-existing software is available that might solve your problem. Maintaining any software is expensive, so if someone else is offering to do it for you... Dart that eco system has a number of pre-exiting tools this guide notes a few of the more common ones. {% hint style="info" %} Drop us a line if you know of some other build tools that you think should be listed here. {% endhint %} ### Native Dart tools To be complete here are some of the build related tools built into dart * dart format - format your source code * dart doc - generates Dart api documenation * dart fix - fixes common lint errors * dart compile - compiles a Dart library with a `main` entry point to an exe * dart create - creates a Dart project ### build\_runner build\_runner is a core Dart package and used by many packages to automate the build process. If you are doing json serialisation then you will already have come across build\_runner as it is used to generate the toJson and fromJson methods. You can also use build\_runner in your on project to automate build steps. Unfortunately the documentation on build runner is fairly sparse and and hard to follow. If you want to use build\_runner have a look at some of the projects that depend on build\_runner. {% hint style="info" %} pub.dev shows a list of packages that use (depend on) a package. This provides an easy way to find sample code for any package. {% endhint %} ### Github Actions Github supports actions which allow you to automate a build/test process each time you push to git. Github actions support Linux, Windows and MacOS which allows you to build a target for multiple OSs. Github actions are essentially a declarative system as opposed to procedural. I've never been a fan of declarative build systems (all the way back to make) as they tend to rely on too many magic interactions between declarative steps. --- # Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question. Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter: ``` GET https://dcli.onepub.dev/improving-your-build-environment/existing-tooling.md?ask= ``` The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language. The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation. Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.