GYP
GYP (Generate Your Projects) is a build automation tool that generates native build files (e.g., Visual Studio projects, Xcode projects, Makefiles) from a platform-independent configuration. It was originally developed by Google to simplify cross-platform development, particularly for projects like Chromium and Node.js, by abstracting platform-specific build system details into a single JSON-like input format.
Developers should learn GYP when working on large, cross-platform C/C++ projects that need to generate build files for multiple operating systems (Windows, macOS, Linux) and IDEs. It is especially useful in legacy or embedded contexts, such as maintaining Chromium-based applications or older Node.js extensions, where it reduces the complexity of managing disparate build systems by providing a unified configuration language.