Some questions about bazel concept

Question

I am learning Bazel and confused by many basic concepts.

    load("//bazel/rules:build_tools.bzl", "build_tools_deps")
    build_tools_deps()      //build_tools_deps is macro or rules?

    load("@bazel_gazelle//:deps.bzl", "gazelle_dependencies")
    gazelle_dependencies()  //what about the @ mean exactly? where is the bazel_gazelle ?
    native.new_git_repository(...) //what about the native mean?

What definition is called a function? what definition is a rule?

Answer 1

A macro is a regular Starlark function that wraps (and expands to) rules.

def my_macro(name = ..., ...):
    native.cc_library(...)
    android_library(...)
    native.genrule(...)

Think of macros as a way to chain and group several rules together, which allows you to pipe the output of some rules into the input of others. At this level, you don't think about how a rule is implemented, but what kinds of inputs and outputs they are associated with.

On the other hand, a rule's declaration is done using the rule() function. cc_library, android_library and genrule are all rules. The rule implementation is abstracted in a regular function that accepts a single parameter for the rule context (ctx).

my_rule = rule(
  attrs = { ... },
  implementation = _my_rule_impl,
)

def _my_rule_impl(ctx):
  outfile = ctx.actions.declare_file(...)
  ctx.actions.run(...)
  return [DefaultInfo(files = depset([outfile]))]

Think of actions as a way to chain and group several command lines together, which works at the level of individual files and running your executables to transform them (ctx.actions.run with exectuable, args, inputs and outputs arguments). Within a rule implementation, you can extract information from rule attributes (ctx.attr), or from dependencies through providers (e.g. ctx.attr.deps[0][DefaultInfo].files)

Note that rules can only be called in BUILD files, not WORKSPACE files.

@ is the notation for a repository namespace. @bazel_gazelle is an external repository fetched in the WORKSPACE by a repository rule (not a regular rule), typically http_archive or git_repository. This repository rule can also be called from a macro, like my_macro above or build_tools_deps in your example.

native.<rule name> means that the rule is implemented in Java within Bazel and built into the binary, and not in Starlark.