How To: Eclipse Maven install build jar with dependencies

Question

I am using Eclipse Maven (m2e) inside Eclipse and I am running my project like this:

My pom.xml looks like this:

Answer 1

There are a couple of ways of doing this.

1) If you want an uber-jar (repacked with all dependencies), look into using and configuring the maven-shade-plugin:

  <build>
    <plugins>
      <plugin>
        <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
        <artifactId>maven-shade-plugin</artifactId>
        <version>1.6</version>
        <executions>
          <execution>
            <phase>package</phase>
            <goals>
              <goal>shade</goal>
            </goals>
            <configuration>
              <transformers>
                <transformer implementation="org.apache.maven.plugins.shade.resource.ManifestResourceTransformer">
                  <mainClass>com.group.id.Launcher1</mainClass>
                </transformer>
              </transformers>
            </configuration>
          </execution>
        </executions>
      </plugin>
    </plugins>
  </build>

This will unpack all dependencies and merge them into one JAR file.

2) If you want to deliver a bundle (zip, tar.gz, etc) with the unpacked JAR files in the bundle (perhaps under lib/) then you need to look into the maven-assembly-plugin:

  <build>
    <plugins>
      <plugin>
        <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
        <artifactId>maven-assembly-plugin</artifactId>
        <version>2.3</version>
        <executions>
          <execution>
            <id>create-distro</id>
            <phase>package</phase>
            <goals>
              <goal>single</goal>
            </goals>
            <configuration>
              <descriptors>
                <descriptor>src/main/assembly/dist.xml</descriptor>
              </descriptors>
            </configuration>
          </execution>
        </executions>
      </plugin>
    </plugins>
  </build>

Note that this requires an assembly descriptor src/main/assembly/dist.xml and example looks like this:

<assembly xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/plugins/maven-assembly-plugin/assembly/1.1.0">
  <id>distribution</id>
  <formats>
    <format>zip</format>
  </formats>

  <dependencySets>
    <dependencySet>
      <useProjectArtifact>false</useProjectArtifact>
      <useTransitiveDependencies>false</useTransitiveDependencies>
      <unpack>false</unpack>
      <scope>runtime</scope>
      <fileMode>0755</fileMode>
      <directoryMode>0755</directoryMode>
      <outputDirectory>bin</outputDirectory>

      <includes>
        <include>com.group.id:project-launch1</include>
        <include>com.group.id:project-launch2</include>
      </includes>

    </dependencySet>
    <dependencySet>
      <useProjectArtifact>false</useProjectArtifact>
      <useTransitiveDependencies>true</useTransitiveDependencies>
      <unpack>false</unpack>
      <scope>runtime</scope>
      <fileMode>0644</fileMode>
      <directoryMode>0755</directoryMode>
      <outputDirectory>lib</outputDirectory>

      <includes>
        <include>com.group.id:project-lib1</include>
        <include>com.group.id:project-lib2</include>
        <include>com.group.id:project-lib3</include>
        <include>com.group.id:project-lib4</include>
      </includes>

    </dependencySet>
  </dependencySets>
</assembly>

And since you are now assembling dependencies, you have better define the dependency in the pom.xml, like so:

  <dependencies>
    <dependency>
      <groupId>com.group.id</groupId>
      <artifactId>project-launch1</artifactId>
      <version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
      <type>jar</type>
    </dependency>
    <dependency>
      <groupId>com.group.id</groupId>
      <artifactId>project-launch2</artifactId>
      <version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
      <type>jar</type>
    </dependency>
    <dependency>
      <groupId>com.group.id</groupId>
      <artifactId>project-lib1</artifactId>
      <version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
      <type>jar</type>
    </dependency>
    ... and so on ...
  </dependencies>

3) If you are delivering a bundle with an executable JAR file launcher, you will likely need to add a maven-jar-plugin configuration in addition to the maven-assembly-plugin:

  <dependencies>
    <dependency>
      <groupId>com.group.id</groupId>
      <artifactId>project-lib1</artifactId>
      <version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
      <type>jar</type>
    </dependency>
    <dependency>
      <groupId>com.group.id</groupId>
      <artifactId>project-lib2</artifactId>
      <version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
      <type>jar</type>
    </dependency>
    <dependency>
      <groupId>com.group.id</groupId>
      <artifactId>project-lib3</artifactId>
      <version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
      <type>jar</type>
    </dependency>
    ... and so on ...
  </dependencies>

  <build>
    <plugins>
      <plugin>
        <artifactId>maven-jar-plugin</artifactId>
        <configuration>
          <archive>
            <addMavenDescriptor>false</addMavenDescriptor>
            <compress>true</compress>
            <manifest>
              <mainClass>com.group.id.Launcher1</mainClass>
              <addClasspath>true</addClasspath>
              <classpathPrefix>../lib/</classpathPrefix>
            </manifest>
          </archive>
        </configuration>
      </plugin>
    </plugins>
  </build>

Note that the "addClasspath" directive adds the project dependencies to the class path. This is needed for JAR launchers, as they explicitly ignore all CLASSPATH environmental variables.