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Problems with Ant build.xml configuration to work with external Libraries and Java property files

I have a problem with Ant Build Tool.
First, below you can see my project structure:
and the content of my build.xml file is:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<project name="addonGenerator" default="main" basedir=".">
<property name="projectName" value="addonGenerator"/>
<property name="src.dir" location="src"/>
<property name="build.dir" location="bin"/>
<property name="dist.dir" location="dist"/>
<target name="compile" description="compile the source ">
<mkdir dir="${build.dir}"/>
<javac srcdir="${src.dir}" destdir="${build.dir}">
<classpath>
<pathelement path="lib/velocity-1.7.jar"/>
<pathelement path="lib/log4j-1.2.16.jar"/>
</classpath>
</javac>
</target>
<target name="dist" description="package, output to JAR">
<mkdir dir="${dist.dir}"/>
<jar jarfile="${dist.dir}/${projectName}.jar" basedir="${build.dir}">
<zipgroupfileset dir="lib" includes="velocity-1.7.jar" />
<zipgroupfileset dir="lib" includes="log4j-1.2.16.jar" />
<manifest>
<attribute name="${projectName}" value="main"/>
<attribute name="Main-Class" value="main.java.AddonGenerator"/>
</manifest>
</jar>
</target>
<target name="clean" description="clean up">
<delete dir="${build.dir}"/>
<delete dir="${dist.dir}"/>
</target>
<target name="main" depends="clean, compile, dist"/>
</project>
I don't know how setup the Ant build.xml to build and run my project with external libraries and the java property file generator.properties

To include your generator.properties file in the .jar file, add your resources directory when building the .jar:
<jar jarfile="${dist.dir}/${projectName}.jar" basedir="${build.dir}">
<fileset dir="src/main/java/resources"/>
Since you are currently building a “fat jar” (by directly including the contents of your library .jars in your application .jar), you can run by simply invoking your .jar file. Such a target obviously requires the .jar file to be built, so it makes sense to depend on the "dist" target:
<target name="run" depends="dist">
<java jar="${dist.dir}/${projectName}.jar"/>
</target>
On another note, I don’t think you want to pass src as your source directory, unless your classes actually declare themselves with ‘package main.java;’ (which they shouldn’t). You should pass the actual root of your packages to the javac task:
<property name="src.dir" location="src/main/java"/>
You should also make the "dist" target depend on "compile", since, well, it depends on having compiled classes available.
I also would suggest that your default target, "main", avoid calling the "clean" target. You should not clean before every single build; that defeats one of the most useful benefits of Ant, namely the ability to update only the things that need to be updated. You should only clean when you need to, with a command like ant clean compile or simply ant clean.
Note that once "dist" depends on "compile", and once "main" no longer calls "clean", you can simply remove the "main" target and change your project’s default target to "dist". When you think about it, this makes sense: the default action is to build and package the application.

Issue while creating war using ant with Jenkins

I have a ant build script which creates a war file. The file content are as follows.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<project name="TestProj" default="war" basedir=".">
<property name="project-name" value="${ant.project.name}" />
<property name="builder" value="IaasTeam" />
<property name="war-file-name" value="${project-name}.war" />
<property name="source-directory" value="src" />
<property name="classes-directory" value="build/classes" />
<property name="web-directory" value="WebContent" />
<property name="web-xml-file" value="WebContent/WEB-INF/web.xml" />
<property name="lib.dir" value="WebContent/WEB-INF/lib" />
<property name="catalina.home" value="../../outside/project/lib"/>
<tstamp prefix="build-info">
<format property="current-date" pattern="d-MMMM-yyyy" locale="en" />
<format property="current-time" pattern="hh:mm:ss a z" locale="en" />
</tstamp>
<property name="build-directory" value="build" />
<path id="classpath">
<fileset dir="${lib.dir}" includes="**/*.jar"/>
<fileset dir="${catalina.home}" includes="**/*.jar"/>
</path>
<target name="clean">
<delete dir="build"/>
</target>
<target name="compile">
<mkdir dir="build/classes"/>
<javac includeantruntime="false" srcdir="src" destdir="build/classes" classpathref="classpath" />
</target>
<target name="war" depends="clean,compile">
<mkdir dir="${build-directory}" />
<delete file="${build-directory}/${war-file-name}" />
<war warfile="${build-directory}/${war-file-name}" webxml="${web-xml-file}">
<classes dir="${classes-directory}" />
<fileset dir="${web-directory}">
<!-- Need to exclude it since webxml is an attribute of the war tag above -->
<exclude name="WEB-INF/web.xml" />
</fileset>
<manifest>
<attribute name="Built-By" value="${builder}" />
<attribute name="Built-On" value="${build-info.current-date}" />
<attribute name="Built-At" value="${build-info.current-time}" />
</manifest>
</war>
</target>
I am using Jenkins as a build server (this is hosted on different machine kind of DEV environment).
I also use Gitlab as a repository and after pushing the latest code I have a hook for Jenkins job which gets triggered automatically and calls this build.xml.
Now the issues here is that when I run this script on my local machine everything works well but when Jenkins execute this it fails during the compilation phase giving me below error.
compile:
[mkdir] Created dir: /app/infra/jenkins/workspace/TestProj/build/classes
[javac] Compiling 49 source files to /app/infra/jenkins/workspace/TestProj/build/classes
BUILD FAILED
/app/infra/jenkins/workspace/TestProj/build.xml:27: /app/infra/jenkins/outside/project/lib does not exist.
The reason for this issue is the build server does not have any directoy called outside/project/lib.
The only reason of adding this directory in my build.xml is to have the container specific jar files ready for compiling.
How can I fix this issue?
Do I need to copy container specific jars on my build server? Or is there any way to tell Jenkins that not to copy this external jars but just use them for compilation.

Where would Jenkins find the jars? They need to be accessible otherwise your build will fail. If you don't want to have the files checked in (which is very sensible), you could use Apache Ivy to download them for you.
This is the most common way of handling the situation you're having. Using a dependency management framework like Ivy (or Maven, or similar) will save you a lot of headaches down the line. I recommend you have a look at their tutorial. After you set it up, your ant build will take care of downloading the files you need.

Using Ant's classpath in Eclipse

I have an Ant build.xml file that works just fine on the command line: it compiles, builds the JAR, and I am able to execute the main method from the JAR just fine. The build.xml file references several thirdparty libraries that are scattered here and there. When building the JAR, the script doesn't include all the thirdparty libraries into the JAR itself. Instead, it puts their path into the JAR's manifest. This helps to keep my JAR slim and tidy.
I'd like to be able to edit and debug my project in Eclipse, but I can't find an easy way to do so. I can have my project use the Ant file to build the project, and that seems to work. However, Eclipse is having trouble finding the thirdparty libaries, and thus Eclipse is having two problems:
it shows (in the text editor) lots of compile errors, because
lots of classes are undefined, and
it can't execute the JAR.
I can solve both of the above problems by specifying by hand, in two difference places (i.e., the build path via Properties->Java Build Path->Libraries, and the execution classpath via Run Configurations->Classpath), all the third party libraries. But it seems like I shouldn't have to do this manually, since all the third party libraries are already listed in my JAR's manifest. What am I doing wrong?
Here's my build.xml file:
<!-- Set global properties for this build -->
<property name="src" location="./src" />
<property name="build" location="./build"/>
<property name="dist" location="./dist"/>
<property name="logs" location="./logs"/>
<property name="docs" location="./docs"/>
<property name="jar" location="${dist}/dynamic_analyzer.jar"/>
<property name="lib" location="../../thirdparty/lib"/>
<property name="hive-util" location="../../hive-utils/dist"/>
<property name="hpdb" location="../../hive-db/hpdb/dist"/>
<property name="static" location="../../hive-backend/static_analyzer/dist"/>
<property name="mainclass" value="com.datawarellc.main.DynamicMain"/>
<path id="dep.runtime">
<fileset dir="${lib}" includes="**/*.jar"/>
<fileset dir="${hive-util}" includes="**/*.jar"/>
<fileset dir="${hpdb}" includes="**/*.jar"/>
<fileset dir="${static}" includes="**/*.jar"/>
</path>
<target name="clean">
<delete dir="${build}"/>
<delete dir="${dist}"/>
<delete dir="${docs}"/>
<delete dir="${logs}"/>
</target>
<target name="init">
<tstamp/>
<mkdir dir="${build}"/>
<mkdir dir="${dist}"/>
<mkdir dir="${logs}"/>
</target>
<target name="compile" depends="init">
<javac srcdir="${src}" destdir="${build}" debug="on" includeantruntime="false">
<classpath refid="dep.runtime" />
</javac>
<!-- Debug output of classpath -->
<property name="myclasspath" refid="dep.runtime"/>
<echo message="Classpath = ${myclasspath}"/>
</target>
<target name="jar" depends="compile">
<!-- Put the classpath in the manifest -->
<manifestclasspath property="manifest_cp" jarfile="${jar}" maxParentLevels="10">
<classpath refid="dep.runtime" />
</manifestclasspath>
<jar jarfile="${jar}" basedir="${build}">
<manifest>
<attribute name="Main-Class" value="${mainclass}"/>
<attribute name="Class-Path" value="${manifest_cp}"/>
</manifest>
<zipfileset dir="${src}" includes="**/*.xml" />
</jar>
</target>
You can see that I have third-party libraries in several directories (${lib}, ${hive-util}, ${hpdb}, and ${static}). I use these to create a path called dep.runtime. I then include dep.runtime in the manifest when building my jar. How can I get Eclipse to use the same dep.runtime for the build path and the classpath when executing?

An alternative to perl is to use an embedded groovy task:
<project name="demo" default="eclipse-files">
<property name="src.dir" location="src"/>
<property name="classes.dir" location="build/classes"/>
<path id="dep.runtime">
<fileset dir="${lib}" includes="**/*.jar"/>
<fileset dir="${hive-util}" includes="**/*.jar"/>
<fileset dir="${hpdb}" includes="**/*.jar"/>
<fileset dir="${static}" includes="**/*.jar"/>
</path>
<target name="bootstrap">
<mkdir dir="${user.home}/.ant/lib"/>
<get dest="${user.home}/.ant/lib/groovy-all.jar" src="http://search.maven.org/remotecontent?filepath=org/codehaus/groovy/groovy-all/2.1.4/groovy-all-2.1.4.jar"/>
</target>
<target name="eclipse-files">
<taskdef name="groovy" classname="org.codehaus.groovy.ant.Groovy"/>
<groovy>
import groovy.xml.MarkupBuilder
project.log "Creating .classpath"
new File(".classpath").withWriter { writer ->
def xml = new MarkupBuilder(writer)
xml.classpath() {
classpathentry(kind:"src", path:properties["src.dir"])
classpathentry(kind:"output", path:properties["classes.dir"])
classpathentry(kind:"con", path:"org.eclipse.jdt.launching.JRE_CONTAINER")
project.references."dep.runtime".each {
classpathentry(kind:"lib", path:it)
}
}
}
</groovy>
</target>
<target name="clean">
<delete file=".classpath"/>
</target>
</project>
Notes:
The bootstrap target will download the 3rd party groovy jar (No dependency on perl)
Groovy can access the "dep.runtime" ANT path directly and iterate over its contents
Groovy has excellent support for writing XML files.
The following answer is similar and additionally generates the Eclipse .project file.
Using Apache Ivy with netbeans

I came up with the following workaround, inspired by the link provided by #leeand00.
First, I wrote a simple Perl script (called genClasspath.pl) that generates the .classpath file that Eclipse uses.
#!/usr/bin/perl
use strict;
if (#ARGV != 2) {
print STDERR "Usage: $0 OUTFILE CLASSPATHSTRING\n";
print STDERR "e.g., $0 .classpath path1:path2:path3\n";
exit 1;
}
my $OUTFILE = $ARGV[0];
my $CLASSPATHSTRING = $ARGV[1];
open my $out_fh, '>', $OUTFILE or die "Couldn't open output file: $!";
print $out_fh q{<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<classpath>
<classpathentry kind="src" path="src"/>
<classpathentry kind="con" path="org.eclipse.jdt.launching.JRE_CONTAINER"/>
<classpathentry kind="output" path="build"/>
};
my #libs = split(":", $CLASSPATHSTRING);
foreach my $thisLib (#libs){
print $out_fh " <classpathentry kind=\"lib\" path=\"$thisLib\"/>\n";
}
print $out_fh "</classpath>\n";
Then, I have my build.xml file call this script with the content of dep.runtime:
<target name="compile" depends="init">
<javac srcdir="${src}" destdir="${build}" debug="on" includeantruntime="false">
<classpath refid="dep.runtime" />
</javac>
<property name="myclasspath" refid="dep.runtime"/>
<exec dir="." executable="../../scripts/genClasspath.pl" os="Linux">
<arg value=".classpath"/>
<arg value="${myclasspath}"/>
</exec>
</target>
The only catch is that I need to run Ant on the command line at least once before I open the project in Eclipse. But when I do, Eclipse is able to compile and execute my project just fine, since the classpath is exactly the same as Ant's.

ANT JAR file for JavaFX Application

I have successfully complied the JavaFX code using Build Script with the previous help. Now I can not able to create JAR file uisng ANT for my application. I am adding sample script in build.xml. My requirement is to create a simple JAR file of my JavaFx XYZ application.
<project name="XYZ" basedir=".">
<property name="WorkingFolder" location="XYZSourceData"/>
<property name="ClassPath" location="C:\Program Files\Oracle\JavaFX 2.2 Runtime\lib\jfxrt.jar;C:\Program Files\Java\jdk1.7.0_09\lib\ant-javafx.jar;"/>
<target name="init">
<echo message="Java installation directory: ${java.home}"/>
<!-- Create the time stamp -->
<tstamp/>
<delete dir="${WorkingFolder}/build"/>
<delete dir="${dist}"/>
<mkdir dir="${WorkingFolder}/CustomJars"/>
</target>
<target name="Compilingxyz" depends="init">
<mkdir dir="${WorkingFolder}/build"/>
<taskdef resource="com/sun/javafx/tools/ant/antlib.xml"
uri="javafx:com.sun.javafx.tools.ant" classpath=".;C:\Program Files\Oracle\JavaFX 2.2 Runtime\lib\jfxrt.jar"/>
<javac classpath="${ClassPath};${WorkingFolder}/CustomJars/*.jar;" srcdir="${WorkingFolder}/src/com/xyz" destdir="${WorkingFolder}/build"/>
</target>
<target name="CreatingxyzJars" depends="Compilingxyz" description="generate the distribution" >
<taskdef resource="com/sun/javafx/tools/ant/antlib.xml"
uri="javafx:com.sun.javafx.tools.ant" classpath="C:\Program Files\Java\jdk1.7.0_09\lib\ant-javafx.jar"/>
<fx:jar destfile="${WorkingFolder}/CustomJars/XYZ.jar">
<fx:application name="XYZ"
mainClass="com.xyz.main.XYZEntryFX"/>
<fx:resources>
<fx:fileset dir="${WorkingFolder}/build" includes="${WorkingFolder}/libs/*.jar"/>
</fx:resources>
<fileset dir="${WorkingFolder}/resources"/>
</fx:jar>
</target>
I am getting following error -
BUILD FAILED
C:\Users\JavaUser4\Desktop\2012.12FX\build.xml:83: The prefix "fx" for element "
fx:jar" is not bound.
Total time: 0 seconds
What is the missing part? I have Java Desktop application. How can I create a ANT JAR for Java Fx Application. Please Help.
I am taking reference of following example -
Example

You're missing the fx: namespace declaration in your project. Rather than
<project name="XYZ" basedir=".">
you need something like:
<project name="XYZ" basedir="."
xmlns:fx="javafx:com.sun.javafx.tools.ant">
(This is from the documentation you linked to, prior page, §12.3 Using JavaFX Ant Tasks.)

Ant built does not generate class files

I'm using build.xml to build my src. However it failed to generate class files without any error message. The full script is
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<project name="auxiliary" basedir="." default="dist">
<property name="src.dir" value="../auxiliary-src/com/nextbio/drugbank"/>
<property name="dist.dir" value="dist"/>
<property name="lib.dir" value="../jboss_config/common_app_jars"/>
<property name="temp.dir" value="temp"/>
<property name="foo_dist.dir" value="../foo/dist"/>
<path id="libs-classpath">
<fileset dir="${foo_dist.dir}">
<include name="foo.jar"/>
</fileset>
</path>
<target name="dist" depends="auxiliary-dist" />
<target name="auxiliary-cleanup">
<delete dir="${temp.dir}"/>
<delete dir="${dist.dir}"/>
<echo message="cleaned up. ${temp.dir}, and ${dist.dir} have been deleted."/>
</target>
<target name ="auxiliary-dist">
<delete dir="${temp.dir}"/>
<echo message="delete ${temp.dir}" />
<mkdir dir="${temp.dir}"/>
<javac destdir="${temp.dir}" source="1.6" target="1.6" debug="on" fork="true" memorymaximumsize="1024m">
<src path="${src.dir}"/>
<classpath>
<path refid="libs-classpath"/>
</classpath>
<include name="com/car/**"/> <!-- troubled line -->
</javac>
<!--<copy overwrite="true" todir="${temp.dir}">
<fileset dir="${src.dir}">
<exclude name="**/*.java"/>
<exclude name="**/*.sql"/>
<exclude name="**/*.txt"/>
</fileset>
</copy>
<delete dir="${dist.dir}"/>
<mkdir dir="${dist.dir}"/>
<jar destfile="${dist.dir}/auxiliary.jar" basedir="${temp.dir}"/> -->
</target>
There is no class file in ${temp.dir} after this step, and no error message. I double checked it, and found it is because of the "troubled line". I tried to add some files to the classpath. I don't know why it is wrong.

The source path should point to the root of the package tree. You make it point to a specific package inside the sources : ../auxiliary-src/com/nextbio/drugbank.
And in the javac task, you ask it to compile all the files matching the pattern com/car/**. That means that it will compile the Java source files in ../auxiliary-src/com/nextbio/drugbank/com/car or in a subdirectory. If that's the case, you have very unconventional package names.

I had the same problem.
My project complilated well but the classes there weren't in nowhere and It didn't have any error message.
My problem was the classpath. The eclipse wizard added EclipseLink 2.5.1 jars.
I removed it and the problem is gone.
I suggest make a simple HelloWord and remove all jars
reference from the classpath and try again.

I encountered this "ant, javac, compile" problem related with the classpath to.
No debug or verbose message shown.
This behavior appear because in classpath exists not compatible (superior) version jar packages and that cause no output classes.