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Ant fails in try catch block

In my ANT build I have the following code:
<trycatch reference="exception_ref">
<try>
<echo>Start Building Delivery</echo>
</try>
<catch>
<property name="exception" refid="exception_ref" />
<property name="message" value="Error in trycatch block:${line.separator}${exception}" />
<echo message="${message}" />
<fail message="${message}" />
</catch>
<finally>
<echo>Finally</echo>
</finally>
</trycatch>
Ant says:
Problem: failed to create task or type trycatch
Cause: The name is undefined.
Action: Check the spelling.
Action: Check that any custom tasks/types have been declared.
Action: Check that any / declarations have taken place.
What am I missing here?
// EDIT: I am using ANT in Eclipse

trycatch is a task provided by the Ant-Contrib third-party library. Make sure to download their Jar and have it referenced on the Ant classpath. See this link for how to do this.
On Eclipse, go to Window -> Preferences -> Ant -> Runtime. Under the Classpath tab, add the Ant-Contrib jar using the "Add External JARs..." button. And as mentioned in the link, you need to declare the tasks as follows:
<taskdef resource="net/sf/antcontrib/antlib.xml"/>

Ant target failing: Antlib or Ivy issue? [duplicate]

This question already has answers here:
Closed 10 years ago.
Possible Duplicate:
Ivy fails to resolve a dependancy, unable to find cause
I'm trying to run the following build task (initIvy):
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<project name="myproject-build" default="package" basedir=".." xmlns:ivy="antlib:org.apache.ivy.ant">
<property file="build/build.properties"/>
<property environment="env"/>
<!-- Ant library path, including all of its plugins. -->
<path id="ant.lib.path">
<fileset dir="${env.ANT_HOME}/lib" includes="*.jar"/>
</path>
<!-- CONFIGURE IVY -->
<taskdef resource="org/apache/ivy/ant/antlib.xml"
uri="antlib:org.apache.ivy.ant" classpathref="ant.lib.path"/>
<!-- Use Ivy tasks to resolve dependencies into the local Ivy cache. -->
<target name="initIvy">
<!-- Initialize Ivy and connect to host repository. -->
<echo message="Initializing Apache Ivy and connecting to the host repository."/>
<ivy:settings url="${ivy.std.repo.settings.url}" realm="${ivy.std.repo.realm}" username="${ivy.std.repo.username}" passwd="${ivy.std.repo.password}"/>
<!-- Clear/flush the Ivy cache. -->
<echo message="Cleaning the local Ivy cache for the current build."/>
<ivy:cleancache/>
</target>
<!-- Rest of buildfile omitted for brevity. -->
</project>
When I run ant -buildfile build.xml initIvy I get the following output:
Buildfile: /<path-to-my-project>/build/build.xml
[taskdef] Could not load definitions from resource org/apache/ivy/ant/antlib.xml. It could not be found.
initIvy:
[echo] Initializing Apache Ivy and connecting to the host repository.
BUILD FAILED
/<path-to-my-project>/build/build.xml:81: Problem: failed to create task or type antlib:org.apache.ivy.ant:settings
Cause: The name is undefined.
Action: Check the spelling.
Action: Check that any custom tasks/types have been declared.
Action: Check that any <presetdef>/<macrodef> declarations have taken place.
No types or tasks have been defined in this namespace yet
This appears to be an antlib declaration.
Action: Check that the implementing library exists in one of:
-/<path-to-my-ANT_HOME>/lib
-/home/myUser/.ant/lib
-a directory added on the command line with the -lib argument
When I go to ${ANT_HOME}/lib, I don't see any JARs labeled "antlib*.jar".
So I'm guessing I downloaded a version of Ant that did not include Antlib, and now that I'm using Ivy (which uses Antlib), the build is choking?
If this is an Antlib issue, then I believe I want one of the distros available here. If so, can someone confirm which one I should use (that only contains Antlib and not anything else), and confirm the process for installing it; i.e., is it just as simple as putting the correct JAR in ${ANT_HOME}/lib? Etc.
If this is an Ivy issue, then can someone point me in the right direction as to what could be going on?
And if this is neither Antlib nor Ivy, ditto for the question directly above. Thanks in advance!

I think you might be missing Apache IVY library. Download it from here - apache ivy Copy the jar in your ant lib directory.
For example (change version numbers as appropriate):
Download and install Ant (e.g., C:\Apps\Tools\apache-ant-1.9.7).
Download and extract Ivy (e.g., C:\Users\UserName\Downloads\apache-ivy-2.4.0)
Copy C:\Users\UserName\Downloads\apache-ivy-2.4.0\ivy-2.4.0.jar into C:\Apps\Tools\apache-ant-1.9.7\lib.
Ant is configured to use Ivy.

Find cause of ant failure

I have some ant files that one imports the other. Specifically build.xml imports a project_default.xml. When I try to do a build I get following error:
Buildfile: C:\myproject\build.xml [taskdef] Could not load
definitions from resource net/sf/antcontrib/antcontrib.properties. It
could not be found.
BUILD FAILED C:\myproject\build.xml:14: The following error occurred
while executing this line: C:\myproject\project_default.xml:17:
Problem: failed to create task or type if Cause: The name is
undefined. Action: Check the spelling. Action: Check that any
custom tasks/types have been declared. Action: Check that any
/ declarations have taken place.
Line 17 that is reported is the following:
<if>
<contains string="${env.PROJECT_SELECTION}" substring="env.PROJECT_SELECTION" />
I also added the following in the build.xml:
<taskdef resource="net/sf/antcontrib/antcontrib.properties">
<classpath>
<pathelement location="D:\UserData\ant-contrib-0.6-bin\lib\ant-contrib-0.6.jar"/>
</classpath>
</taskdef>
But got the same error. Any idea of what is the problem here?

with ant version > 1.6 you should use "net/sf/antcontrib/antlib.xml" instead of "net/sf/antcontrib/antcontrib.properties"
so change the taskdef to this:
<taskdef resource="net/sf/antcontrib/antlib.xml">
<classpath>
<pathelement location="D:\UserData\ant-contrib-0.6-bin\lib\ant-contrib-0.6.jar"/>
</classpath>
</taskdef>
cheers,

The first thing to check is that you have the ant-contrib jar path corrext. Run ant with -verbose to get more info about what it's doing and what tasks it's trying to load from where.
Where did you add the taskdef? If you're using the <if> task outside a target then you need the taskdef before it, also outside a target. If you're using it inside a target then the taskdef can be (textually) after the call as long as it is either outside a target or in a target that runs before the <if> in dependency order.

Programmatically executing ANT script in Java

I've built a swing gui in eclipse that is supposed to run a bunch of code previously developed, part of which involves running ant to build the code. When I run the any script outside of the GUI (in the original project) the ant executes correctly and builds the project. However when I try and run ant programmatically it throws errors that look like the project doesn't have the necessary .jars. The code, top of the build.xml, and errors are listed below.
Code Block
File buildFile = new File("lib\\ePlay\\build.xml");
Project p = new Project();
p.setUserProperty("ant.file", buildFile.getAbsolutePath());
DefaultLogger consoleLogger = new DefaultLogger();
consoleLogger.setErrorPrintStream(System.err);
consoleLogger.setOutputPrintStream(System.out);
consoleLogger.setMessageOutputLevel(Project.MSG_INFO);
p.addBuildListener(consoleLogger);
try {
p.fireBuildStarted();
p.init();
ProjectHelper helper = ProjectHelper.getProjectHelper();
p.addReference("ant.projectHelper", helper);
helper.parse(p, buildFile);
p.executeTarget(p.getDefaultTarget());
p.fireBuildFinished(null);
} catch (BuildException e) {
p.fireBuildFinished(e);
}
Build.xml
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<project name="EPlay" xmlns:ivy="antlib:org.apache.ivy.ant" default="resolve">
<dirname file="${ant.file}" property="ant.dir" />
<property name="scm.user" value="scmrel"/>
<property name="scm.user.key" value="/.ssh/scmrel/id_rsa"/>
<property name="ivy.jar" value="ivy-2.0.0.jar" />
<property name="ivy.settings.dir" value="${ant.dir}/ivysettings" />
<property name="VERSION" value="LATEST" />
<property name="tasks.dir" value="${ant.dir}/.tasks" />
<property name="deploy.dir" value="${ant.dir}/deploy" />
...
<!-- retrieve the dependencies using Ivy -->
<target name="resolve" depends="_loadantcontrib,_getivy" description=" retrieve the dependencies with Ivy">
<ivy:settings file="${ivy.settings.dir}/ivysettings.xml" />
<ivy:resolve file="${ant.dir}/ivy.xml" transitive="false" />
<ivy:retrieve pattern="${deploy.dir}/[conf]/[artifact].[ext]"/>
</target>
And the error
resolve:
BUILD FAILED
H:\eclipse\CLDeploySwing\lib\ePlay\build.xml:66: Problem: failed to create task or type antlib:org.apache.ivy.ant:settings
Cause: The name is undefined.
Action: Check the spelling.
Action: Check that any custom tasks/types have been declared.
Action: Check that any <presetdef>/<macrodef> declarations have taken place.
No types or tasks have been defined in this namespace yet
This appears to be an antlib declaration.
Action: Check that the implementing library exists in one of:
-ANT_HOME\lib
-the IDE Ant configuration dialogs
Total time: 0 seconds
I've looked through my ant installation and it appears everything is there. Like I said, the original project builds successfully if build.xml is run outside of this application.

I would suggest that this is causde because your java program does not have the same classpath, where it is running, as does the normal ant build - and thus the ANT_HOME isn't the right one.
You can make sure that this is correct by passing the right enviornmental variables into the JVM, or simply a call to System.getProperty("ANT_HOME"), to see where your ANT_HOME actually is residing.

I think ${basedir} for your project is not properly calculated.
Add this line to your build.xml
<echo message="basedir='${basedir}'/>
Looking at this line
File buildFile = new File("lib\\ePlay\\build.xml");
It may be that it's 2 levels up ( I know the documentation says that it should be a parent directory of build.xml, but you are not running from the command line ).

rather than load the ivy library using the new method of using the namespace in the project declaration go old school on it.
<path id="ivy.lib.path">
<fileset dir="path/to/dir/with/ivy/jar" includes="*.jar"/>
</path>
<taskdef resource="org/apache/ivy/ant/antlib.xml"
uri="antlib:org.apache.ivy.ant" classpathref="ivy.lib.path"/>
I am doing something in Gradle that requires this
ant.taskdef(name: 'ivy-retrieve', classname: 'org.apache.ivy.ant.IvyRetrieve', classpath: '...path to ivy jar.../ivy-2.2.0.jar')
which in ant would be something like
<taskdef name="ivy-retrieve" classname="org.apache.ivy.ant.IvyRetrieve"/>
I know it's more klunky and simply not as nice as including the namespace declaration but it does remove some of the confusion regarding which libraries on which classpath are being loaded.

Java Ant - how to pass a ProGuard task arguments and use them inside a configuration file?

I have this in my build.xml:
<target depends="build-jar" name="proguard">
<taskdef resource="proguard/ant/task.properties" classpath="tools/proguard4.6/lib/proguard.jar" />
<proguard configuration="ant/proguard.conf" />
</target>
It works fine.
Inside the configuration file (i.e "ant/proguard.conf") I'm trying to access properties defined in this build.xml file but I'm always getting this kind of error:
Value of system property 'jar.final_name' is undefined in '<jar.final_name>' in line 1 of file '.......\ant\proguard.conf'
The error is clear. Question is how I do what I'm trying to?
If I'd do it the "Embedded ProGuard configuration options" way I could use these properties like any other property in build.xml, but I'm trying to keep the files separate.
How do I do that then?

By default, Ant doesn't provide a way to set java system properties for its tasks. You can only specify -D options in the ANT_OPTS system variable when starting Ant itself.
I'll consider supporting the use of Ant properties in referenced ProGuard configurations (being the developer of ProGuard).
For the time being, an acceptable solution might be to specify input and output jars in Ant's XML-style:
<proguard configuration="ant/proguard.conf">
<injar name="${injar}" />
<outjar name="${outjar}" />
<libraryjar name="${java.home}/lib/rt.jar" />
</proguard>
This part of the configuration is more closely tied to the Ant script anyway.