DZone
Thanks for visiting DZone today,
Edit Profile
  • Manage Email Subscriptions
  • How to Post to DZone
  • Article Submission Guidelines
Sign Out View Profile
  • Post an Article
  • Manage My Drafts
Over 2 million developers have joined DZone.
Log In / Join
Refcards Trend Reports Events Over 2 million developers have joined DZone. Join Today! Thanks for visiting DZone today,
Edit Profile Manage Email Subscriptions Moderation Admin Console How to Post to DZone Article Submission Guidelines
View Profile
Sign Out
Refcards
Trend Reports
Events
Zones
Culture and Methodologies Agile Career Development Methodologies Team Management
Data Engineering AI/ML Big Data Data Databases IoT
Software Design and Architecture Cloud Architecture Containers Integration Microservices Performance Security
Coding Frameworks Java JavaScript Languages Tools
Testing, Deployment, and Maintenance Deployment DevOps and CI/CD Maintenance Monitoring and Observability Testing, Tools, and Frameworks
Partner Zones AWS Cloud
by AWS Developer Relations
Culture and Methodologies
Agile Career Development Methodologies Team Management
Data Engineering
AI/ML Big Data Data Databases IoT
Software Design and Architecture
Cloud Architecture Containers Integration Microservices Performance Security
Coding
Frameworks Java JavaScript Languages Tools
Testing, Deployment, and Maintenance
Deployment DevOps and CI/CD Maintenance Monitoring and Observability Testing, Tools, and Frameworks
Partner Zones
AWS Cloud
by AWS Developer Relations

Adding Version Information to your JAR’s Manifest

Roger Hughes user avatar by
Roger Hughes
·
Feb. 06, 12 · Interview
Like (0)
Save
Tweet
Share
20.42K Views

Join the DZone community and get the full member experience.

Join For Free

One of the handy things about using Maven is that, by default, the names of the artifacts it creates include the current version number from the POM's version tag. It doesn’t matter what type of artifact it is, whether it’s a JAR, WAR or EAR you generally end up with something like this:

    my_module-1.2.3-RELEASE.jar

And this is all usually fine when you’re dealing with a project that’s built solely using Maven. It does, however, become a little more inconvenient if you’re developing JAR files with Maven, but your WAR file is developed using Ant. In this case, when you have to check files in to the /WEB-INF/libs directory yourself (perish the thought) and your JAR file changes often, you end up constantly adding and deleting files from your version control system. From experience, it turns out to be more convenient, in terms of file management, if you remove the version number from the JAR file name and use something like this:

    my_module.jar

However, there will always be the need to know the version of your JAR that has been included in your webapp’s WAR file and that’s where the maven-jar-plugin comes in handy. This allows you to write custom information into your JAR file’s manifest as shown by the POM file snippet below.

<build>
   <finalName>${project.artifactId}</finalName>
   <plugins>
      <plugin>
         <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
         <artifactId>maven-jar-plugin</artifactId>
         <version>2.3.2</version>
         <configuration>
            <archive>
               <index>true</index>
               <manifestSections>
                  <manifestSection>
                     <name>${project.name}</name>
                     <manifestEntries>
                        <mode>development</mode>
                        <groupId>${project.groupId}</groupId>
                        <artifactId>${project.artifactId}</artifactId>
                        <version>${project.version}</version>
                     </manifestEntries>
                  </manifestSection>
               </manifestSections>
            </archive>
         </configuration>
      </plugin>
</build>

The POM file extract above contains two handy features. The first:

    <finalName>${project.artifactId}</finalName>

...removes the version number from the JAR file name by specifying the finalname tag. In this case the finalname has been set to the project.artifactId. This means that if your artifact tag looks something like this...

 <artifactId>my_module</artifactId>

...then your jar file will be called:

    my_module.jar

For more on Maven’s default properties take a look at this blog from last January.

The second task accomplished by the POM extract above is to use the maven-jar-plugin to add group, artifact and version information to the jar’s manifest file. The lines that are responsible for this are:

    <groupId>${project.groupId}</groupId>
    <artifactId>${project.artifactId}</artifactId>
    <version>${project.version}</version>

You can obviously add any information you want to a jar’s manifest file, but in this scenario, adding the version number was extremely useful when it came to support and tracing problems.

 

From http://www.captaindebug.com/2012/01/adding-version-information-to-your-jars.html

JAR (file format) Manifest (transportation)

Opinions expressed by DZone contributors are their own.

Popular on DZone

  • Real-Time Analytics for IoT
  • Testing Repository Adapters With Hexagonal Architecture
  • DevOps vs Agile: Which Approach Will Win the Battle for Efficiency?
  • Understanding and Solving the AWS Lambda Cold Start Problem

Comments

Partner Resources

X

ABOUT US

  • About DZone
  • Send feedback
  • Careers
  • Sitemap

ADVERTISE

  • Advertise with DZone

CONTRIBUTE ON DZONE

  • Article Submission Guidelines
  • Become a Contributor
  • Visit the Writers' Zone

LEGAL

  • Terms of Service
  • Privacy Policy

CONTACT US

  • 600 Park Offices Drive
  • Suite 300
  • Durham, NC 27709
  • support@dzone.com
  • +1 (919) 678-0300

Let's be friends: