Rake (software) Rake is a software task management and build automation tool. It allows the user to specify tasks and describe dependencies as well as to group tasks in a namespace. It is similar to SCons and Make, but it has a number of differences. The tool is written in the Ruby programming language and the Rakefiles use Ruby syntax. It was created by Jim Weirich. Rake uses Ruby's anonymous function blocks to define various tasks, allowing the use of Ruby syntax. It has a library of common tasks: for example