Develop Reference

Fail build on PMD errors/warnings

I have a JAVA ANT project and I am trying to integrate PMD scripts with it so that I can check for all errors and warnings in my project.
Below is snippet of ANT script which I have added in my build.xml:
<property name="pmd.dir" value="buildconfig/build/pmd/" />
<path id="pmd.lib" >
<fileset dir="${pmd.dir}">
<include name="*.jar"/>
<exclude name="/rulesets" />
</fileset>
</path>
<target name="pmd" depends="init">
<echo message="PMD Starting-----" />
<taskdef name="pmd" classname="net.sourceforge.pmd.ant.PMDTask" classpathref="pmd.lib"/>
<pmd shortFilenames="true">
<ruleset>unusedcode</ruleset>
<formatter type="text" toFile="${pmd.dir}/pmd-ant-results.txt"/>
<fileset dir="modules/app/">
<include name="**/*.java"/>
</fileset>
</pmd>
</target>
ANT build is working fine with PMD giving proper error reports but I need to abort the build as failure when PMD encounters any errors in code.
I tried adding failOnRuleViolation="yes" but that did not stop build.
Is there anything else I need to add in script?

Try failOnRuleViolation="true" instead of failOnRuleViolation="yes"...
<pmd shortFilenames="true" failOnRuleViolation="true">
...
Some Ant tasks treat true and yes as equivalent, but many tasks don't know how to handle yes at all. It is possible that <pmd> is one of those tasks that doesn't handle yes.
As a rule of thumb, avoid this gotcha in the future by always using true and false instead of yes and no.

Classpath, Compile, and Run with Ant?

I'm completely new to Ant and need to add a couple jars to my classpath, compile a couple .java files, and run a junit test, all in Ant. I've been looking at a few online tutorials and manuals, but can't seem to wrap my head around the entire xml writing process.
All the previously-written code resides in a single directory called XXX.
In XXX there are two jars I need to add to my classpath with export CLASSPATH=$CLASSPATH:jar1:jar2, two java files I compile with javac *.java, one of which contains several junit tests that I run with java org.junit.runner.JUnitCore Tests. The build.xml would reside in XXX as well (I believe).
So far I have the following for just compiling, although I think there's a lot missing.
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<project name="EtlAutomation" default="compile" basedir=".">
<property name="src" value="${basedir}"/>
<target name="compile">
<!-- Compile .java files -->
<javac srcdir="${src}" destdir="${src}"/>
</target>
</project>
What else do I need to add to compile *.java in the current directory? How can I run the export CLASSPATH command, and finally the junit commend?
I'm not asking for anyone to write my code, but it would be appreciated. If anyone knows a good beginner tutorial for a unix environment, that would be awesome. I'm a total beginner with ant so I'll take what I can get.

Here is a previous question addressing this. And this may work for you:
<project name="EtlAutomation" default="compile" basedir=".">
<property name="src" value="${basedir}"/>
<path id="compile.classpath">
<fileset dir="./">
<include name="*.jar"/>
</fileset>
</path>
<target name="compile" >
<javac destdir="${src}" srcdir="${src}">
<classpath refid="compile.classpath"/>
</javac>
</target>
<target name="run" depends="compile">
<junit>
<classpath refid="compile.classpath" />
<test name="TestExample" />
</junit>
</target>
</project>

wsimport generates faulty code

I use wsimport to generate my java stub files. For this, I use an ant build file in Eclipse:
<taskdef name="wsimport" classname="com.sun.tools.ws.ant.WsImport">
<classpath>
<fileset dir="../lib">
<include name="jaxws-tools.jar" />
</fileset>
</classpath>
</taskdef>
<target name="generate">
<wsimport wsdl="../wsdl/Knowledgebase.wsdl"
destdir="../bin"
sourcedestdir="../gen"
keep="true"
xendorsed="true">
</wsimport>
</target>
The task runs without any errors. It creates different java-files, also Knowledgebase.java and KnowledgebasePort.java. In der Knowledgebase.java, there are these constructors:
public Knowledgebase(WebServiceFeature... features) {
super(__getWsdlLocation(), KNOWLEDGEBASE_QNAME, features);
}
For them I get an error "The constructor Service(...) is undefined". I imported the current jax-ws jar files. Is my generation process broken, do I use the wrong jars or where is the error?

The Service object is provided by the Java EE SDK. It added a new constructor between Java EE 5 and Java EE 6. It would seem the wsimport you're using is from a Java EE 6 JDK and the compiler is using a Java EE 5 SDK?

If we using for example java 1.6.0_27 and Metro 2.2 we need to ENDORSE the webservices-api.jar.
We have to put this jar into folder java-install-dir\jre\lib\endorsed\
In case of using Eclipse, we have to ensure that we are using the correct JRE from the directory java-install-dir. This is done in Window->Preferences->Java->Installed JREs->Add.
Now the error "The constructor Service(...) is undefined" should disappear.

You can set xendorsed="true" and xnocompile="false" and let ant compile your generated java files and it worked for me
<taskdef name="wsimport" classname="com.sun.tools.ws.ant.WsImport">
<classpath>
<fileset dir="${ext.myproject.path}/lib">
<include name="*.jar"/>
</fileset>
<fileset dir="${platformhome}/resources/ant/lib">
<include name="*.jar"/>
</fileset>
</classpath>
</taskdef>
<macrodef name="myproject_before_compile_core">
<sequential>
<mkdir dir="${ext.myproject.path}/gensrc"/>
<mkdir dir="${ext.myproject.path}/classes"/>
<echo message="Generating WS stubs for Simulate BOM Service"/>
<wsimport wsdl="${ext.myproject.path}/resources/wsdl/service.wsdl" package="com.xx.energy.yy.xyz.ws.stubs.service" xnocompile="false" destdir="${ext.myproject.path}/classes" sourcedestdir="${ext.myproject.path}/gensrc" keep="true" wsdlLocation="${ext.myproject.path}/resources/wsdl" xendorsed="true">
<produces dir="${ext.myproject.path}/gensrc/com/xx/energy/yy/xyz/ws/stubs/service">
<include name="*.java"/>
</produces>
<depends file="${ext.myproject.path}/resources/wsdl/service.wsdl"/>
</wsimport>
</sequential>
</macrodef>

Eclipse: Ant script to export User Library/Libraries for project

I am new to Java programming. I initially started with NetBeans but have moved to Eclipse given the advice from a friend.
In NetBeans, a pre-written ant build script for the project would generate a Project.jar file and place all required libraries/jars in a lib/ folder.
However, in Eclipse it appears that I need to write my own ant script. I have written a few lines to generate the jar file:
<target name="compile">
<mkdir dir="${build.dir}"/>
<javac srcdir="${src.dir}" destdir="${build.dir}" classpathref="jars" debug="on"/>
</target>
How do I write a command to copy all of the jars in my User Library to a ${build.dir}/lib/ folder?
Thanks.

Use the copy task
like so, with the appropriate include or exclude pattern
<copy todir="${build.dir}/lib/">
<fileset dir="src_dir">
<include name="**/*.jar"/>
</fileset>
</copy>
<copy todir="${build.dir}/lib/">
<fileset dir="src_dir" excludes="**/*.java"/>
</copy>

If you are new to Java take the chance to have a look at maven. It is a build tool like ant with a lot of predefined 'goals' and a fully developed dependency (to other libraries) handling. You will find a eclipse plugin which will be very useful.
Maven projects have a special directory layout which is kind of best practise and helpful for beginners. If you work on a maven project you can just use the command
mvn dependency:copy-dependencies
as a console command (or eclipse run configuration) to copy your project dependencies (libraries) to the <project>\target\dependency directory.

I recommend to use ant4eclipse library for ant based eclipse projects. When you use it, you can access eclipse workspace/project settings, and can iterate tought eclipse project class path in ant.
See the example code bellow:
<path id="ant.classpath">
<fileset dir="${lib.dir}/ant4eclipse">
<include name="*.jar" />
</fileset>
<taskdef resource="net/sf/antcontrib/antlib.xml" />
<taskdef resource="net/sf/ant4eclipse/antlib.xml" />
<targetPlatform
<target name="copy_jars">
<getEclipseClasspath workspace="${basedir}/.."
projectname="TestProject"
targetPlatformLocation="c:/eclipse"
property="classpath"
relative="false"
runtime="true"
pathseparator="#" />
<!-- iterate over all classpath entries -->
<foreach list="${classpath}" delimiter="#"
target="copy_jar_file" param="classpath.entry" />
</target>
<target name="copy_jar_file">
<!-- check if current is a .jar-file ... -->
<if>
<isfileselected file="${classpath.entry}">
<filename name="**/*.jar" />
</isfileselected>
<then>
<!-- copy the jar file to a destination directory -->
<copy file="${classpath.entry}" tofile="${dest.dir}"/>
</then>
</if>
</target>
If you would like to use user libraries, you can define it by userlibraries command.

ant deploy problem

I am working on a spring project. I use ant to deploy application and STS (eclipse based) IDE to develop. I set the CATALINA_HOME environment variable
echo $CATALINA_HOME
/home/username/springsource/apache-tomcat
When I run the deploy ant task from IDE it deploys to a folder under
/home/username/workspace/myproject/${env.CATALINA_HOME}/webapp
but not
/home/username/springsource/apache-tomcat/webapp
Do you know any fix?
My build.properties file
src.dir=src
web.dir=web
build.dir=${web.dir}/WEB-INF/classes
name=myproject
appserver.home=${env.CATALINA_HOME}
deploy.path=${appserver.home}/webapps
appserver.lib=${appserver.home}/lib
and build.xml file
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<project name="kervan" basedir="." default="usage">
<property environment="env"/>
<property file="build.properties"/>
<path id="cp">
<fileset dir="${web.dir}/WEB-INF/lib">
<include name="*.jar"/>
</fileset>
<fileset dir="${appserver.lib}">
<include name="servlet-api.jar"/>
</fileset>
<pathelement path="${build.dir}"/>
</path>
<target name="usage">
<echo message=""/>
<echo message="${name} build file"/>
<echo message="-----------------------------------"/>
<echo message=""/>
<echo message="Available targets are:"/>
<echo message=""/>
<echo message="build --> Build the application"/>
<echo message="deploy --> Deploy application as a WAR file"/>
<echo message=""/>
</target>
<target name="build" description="Compile main source tree java files">
<mkdir dir="${build.dir}"/>
<javac destdir="${build.dir}" source="1.6" target="1.6"
debug="true" deprecation="false" optimize="false"
failonerror="true">
<src path="${src.dir}"/>
<classpath refid="cp"/>
</javac>
</target>
<target name="deploy" depends="build" description="Deploy application as a WAR file">
<war destfile="${name}.war"
webxml="${web.dir}/WEB-INF/web.xml">
<fileset dir="${web.dir}">
<include name="**/*.*"/>
</fileset>
</war>
<copy todir="${deploy.path}" overwrite="true">
<fileset dir=".">
<include name="*.war"/>
</fileset>
</copy>
</target>
</project>

Try putting the following after the two <property> lines:
<echo message="CATALINA_HOME=${env.CATALINA_HOME}" />
and see what it outputs. If it in fact outputs the correct value, then something strange may be happening. If it outputs the literal string
CATALINA_HOME=${env.CATALINA_HOME}
then somehow your ant script hasn't picked up the environment variable.
Note that when you set an environment variable for your system, only applications launched AFTER the variable is set will recognize the new variable. And variables set from the command line will only be recognized if the application being launched is being launched from that same command line session.

If you're running from within Eclipse or an Eclipse-like environment, Eclipse can be kind of weird in that depending on how you launch it, it's startup scripts won't make your environment natively available to your in-IDE Ant build process.
With my Eclipse-based Ant build, I had to manually set the environment. So for me, I right click on my project & go to "Properties". Then I click on the "Builders" section. I select my "Ant Builder" and click "Edit...". Under this section there's an "Environment" tab where you can specify environment variables and their corresponding values.
Even if you're not using Eclipse exactly like I was, poke around in the build properties and you should be able to find a way to specify environment variables and make them available to the build process.

Is CATALINA_HOME set in your environment?
e.g. Windows
echo %CATALINA_HOME%
Linux
echo $CATALINA_HOME
You could always hardcode the value in your properties file if it's not getting resolved correctly but provided it's in your environment then it should work.
The forum here discusses the same problem:
http://www.nabble.com/%3Cproperty-environment%3D%E2%80%9Denv%E2%80%9D%3E-doesn%27t-pick-up-an-environment-variable-td21481164.html

When run from eclipse, I don't believe the environment is passed to ant. You will have to specify each of the environment variables (and the values) that you want passed to ant in the configuration of the build file within eclipse.

if you are set your environmental variable in global
/etc/environment
thats the problem in Ubuntu. Ant does not pick the environment variable from here.
But the echo $CATALINA_HOME works fine in terminal. I am facing the same problem.
set your environment in .bashrc may fix your problem.

I recently suffered a similar issue.
The problem was in the CATALINA_HOME environment variable: I needed to close the path with a backslash ("/"):
$ export CATALINA_HOME=/home/username/springsource/apache-tomcat/
After fixing that I could deploy the application with ant.

Please make sure you end your path with a / and it shall solve your problem.
example: export JAVA_HOME=/opt/java/
instead of: export JAVA_HOME=/opt/java