With Maven, how can I build a distributable that has my project's jar and all of the dependent jars?

Question

I have a project (of type \'jar\') that (obviously) builds a jar. But that project has many dependencies. I\'d like Maven to build a \"package\" or \"assembly\" that cont

Answer 1

Here is my solution to create a distributable .zip (or .tar.gz / .tar.bz2) including all dependencies in a lib folder. It will:

1. Create a jar with a Manifest including the dependencies of the lib directory as the classpath and the main class to run when executing the jar.
2. Copy all dependent jars to the target/lib directory.
3. Create the distributable `zip with the main jar and all dependent jars of the lib directory.

Excerpt from pom.xml:

    org.apache.maven.plugins
    maven-jar-plugin
    
        
            
                true
                lib/
                full.path.to.MainClass
            
        
    


    maven-dependency-plugin
    
        
            package
            
                copy-dependencies
            
            
                ${project.build.directory}/lib
            
        
    


    org.apache.maven.plugins
    maven-assembly-plugin
    
        
            package
            
                attached
            
            
                
                    src/main/resources/dist.xml
                
            
        
    

dist.xml:

    bin
    
        zip
        tar.gz
    
    
        
            ${project.basedir}
            /
            
                README*
                LICENSE*
                NOTICE*
            
        
        
            ${project.build.directory}
            /
            
                *.jar
            
        
        
            ${project.build.directory}/lib
            lib
            
                *.jar
            
        
        
            ${project.build.directory}/site
            docs
        
    

The dist.xml was derived from the bin descriptor format here: http://maven.apache.org/plugins/maven-assembly-plugin/descriptor-refs.html#bin