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

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.

Related

Why combine all jars together?

I have create RESTful web service based on the JAX-RS and used Jersey embedded web server. My ant script compiles code successfully while it gives me error ClassNotFoundException when I run my main class. So after doing research I came up with solution & here it goes java build ant file with external jar files . What I did was created a bundled jar file try to execute that & it works perfectly fine. I want to know the reason behind :
why this solution works ?
Why I should combine all jar file ?
Is it similar to war file which we create following J2EE architecture otherwise war will not be extracted by server ( say TOMCAT ) & in my case jar file for Jersey embedded HTTP server?
EDIT:
Here is my ant build.xml file
<property name="lib.dir" value="${user.dir}/lib"/>
<property name="build.dir" value="${user.dir}/build"/>
<property name="build.lib.dir" value="${build.dir}/lib"/>
<property name="build.classes.dir" value="${build.dir}/classes"/>
<property name="src.dir" value="${user.dir}/src/main/java"/>
<property name="main.class" value="com.assignment.ConsoleServer"/>
<path id="classpath">
<fileset dir="${lib.dir}" includes="**/*.jar"/>
</path>
<target name="clean">
<delete dir="${build.dir}"/>
</target>
<target name="init" depends="clean">
<!-- Create the build directory structure used by compile -->
<mkdir dir="${build.dir}"/>
<mkdir dir="${build.classes.dir}"/>
</target>
<target name="copy_jars" depends="init" >
<copy todir="${build.lib.dir}" >
<fileset dir="${lib.dir}">
<include name="**/*.jar" />
</fileset>
</copy>
</target>
<target name="compile" depends="copy_jars">
<javac srcdir="${src.dir}" destdir="${build.classes.dir}" classpathref="classpath" includeantruntime="false"/>
</target>
<target name="jar" depends="compile">
<jar destfile="${build.dir}/${ant.project.name}.jar" basedir="${build.classes.dir}">
<manifest>
<attribute name="Main-Class" value="${main.class}"/>
</manifest>
<zipgroupfileset dir="${lib.dir}" includes="*.jar"/>
</jar>
</target>
<target name="run" depends="jar">
<java fork="true" classname="${main.class}">
<classpath>
<path refid="classpath"/>
<path location="${build.dir}/${ant.project.name}.jar"/>
</classpath>
</java>
</target>
Here is my folder structure
P.S. I am not java expert so pardon me if this question is stupid.
Why this solution works?
In your particular case, you probably didn't include all of the necessary dependencies in your deployment in your previous. (It is not clear from your question how you were originally doing the deployment.)
Now you have put all of the application and dependent class files, etc into one JAR file, and presumably you are deploying / running that file. It works because now it has everything that it needs to run ... which it didn't before.
Why I should combine all jar file?
In your case I suspect that it was not strictly necessary. There was probably a way to "deploy" all of the dependencies without combining them into a single JAR file.
However, there is one case where a "uber-jar" has advantages. That is when the JAR is intended to be an "executable" JAR, and you want to be able to distribute / install it as a single file. (And executable JAR
file can refer to external JARs, etc, but the way that you have to do
it is "fragile".)
Is it similar to war file ... ?
Sort of, though a WAR file contains JAR files ... and typically other kinds of resources that the web-container understands.
The solution works because you packed all you service classes and depending libraries in one jar. That jar and everything inside will be in the class path and visible to your execution virtual machines class loader.
If you leave your depending libraries out your Jersey Web server needs to have them on it's class path, then you wouldn't get ClassNotFoundExcpetion
You shouldn't pack web application in single jar. You should crate war file where you dependencies will be placed inside WEB-INF/lib. You would easily then deploy that war on any application server. Switching to Maven instead of Ant can help a lot.
EDIT: After you added more details to description and ant
If you don't want to use fat-jar you can either
modify your antjava task to specify classpath that will reference
all external libraries (basically telling ant how to build
-classpath parameter for java -jar command
even better, modify your javac ant task by making complete Manifest file that specifies Class-Path correctly, take a better
look at the solution (at the bottom) of the answer you linked (java build ant file with external jar files)
For completness reference on Manifest here

How to add external .jar to android project? (with certain conditions)

I need to add some external .jar files to my android project BUT
1) without using Eclipse or any other IDE (so no .classpath)
2) without copying them to /libs folder, i need them to stay where they are
How can i accomplish that? I know that ant should have this functionality but and cant find it. It would be great if there is something like adding "android.library.reference" to project.properties but for .jar instead of library project.
i am not sure that it will work for you but you can use this
<path id="class.path">
<fileset dir="jar_folder">
<include name="**/*.jar" />
</fileset>
</path>
and you can use it in javac command as
<javac executable="${env.JAVA_HOME}/bin/javac" encoding="utf-8" srcdir="src/" destdir="temp/" debug="on" debuglevel="lines,source,var" fork="true" memoryInitialSize="256m" memoryMaximumSize="1024m">
<classpath refid="class.path" />
</javac>

How can I build my jar file so that users who use the library will be able to see the javadoc in Eclipse

I'm working on a small library for our in-company use, and have been heavily documenting it. Now I'm building my jar with the following code:
<project name="commonutils" default="compile" basedir=".">
<property name="src" location="src" />
<property name="build" location="buildDirecotry" />
<target name="compile">
<delete file="${ant.project.name}.jar" />
<mkdir dir="${build}"/>
<javac srcdir="${src}" destdir="${build}" debug="on" target="1.5">
<classpath>
<pathelement location="lib/build/server.zip" />
<pathelement path="${java.class.path}/"/>
</classpath>
</javac>
<jar basedir="${build}" destfile="${ant.project.name}.jar" />
<delete dir="${build}" />
</target>
</project>
Which works fine, it builds my jar file with all the src files in it, but when I include the jar file in another project I no-longer have any of my javadoc comments. Using JDDecompiler I cannot see the comments in the class file, although I'm not sure if its the java compiler that's stripping them or JD.
My question is: How can I build my jar file so that users who use the library will be able to see the javadoc in Eclipse.
If you include the source files in the jar (each class and java file in the same package-directory) it should work.
<target name="jar.noCompile.src">
<jar destfile="${ant.project.name}.jar">
<fileset dir="${build}"/>
<fileset dir="${src}" includes="**/*.java"/>
</jar>
</target>
AFAIK the documentation is an Eclipse feature. You have to configure it manually. In your build generate the documentation (usually into folder 'javadoc') and package it with the JAR. Once someone wants to use your library, he/she has to go into Java Build Path select libraries, add yours, click next to it to open the tree node and then double click on Javadoc location to configure it.

Linked folder not resolved by Ant in eclipse

In my build.xml, below works fine :-
<path id="build.classpath">
<fileset dir="lib [myUtils]" includes="*.jar" />
</path>
if lib [myUtils] is of folder type, but don't works, if it's of Linked Folder type.
Also, I found this when googled :-
https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=265960
https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=43081
https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=265960
Is there any trick to achieve this, without copying the dependencies in work folder??
Note that ant should work outside of eclipse as well. So you can't reply in IDE abstractions. You can use symbolic links (if your OS supports them).
If not, you can use the FileSync plugin to synchronize eclipse project folders with external folders. Or you can simply use the <copy> ant task.
I resolved this using copy task:
<copy todir="target/web/linked1">
<fileset dir="../linkdProject/source1" />
</copy>
<copy todir="target/web/linked2">
<fileset dir="../linkedProject/source2" />
</copy>
....
<war destfile="target/webApp.war">
<fileset dir="WebContent" />
<fileset dir="target/web" /> <!-- copy linked resources -->
...
</war>
<delete dir="target"/>

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

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