Currently I'm building a small personal project in Java which is a simple file server. I've implemented basic internationalization with usage of ResourceBundle. I'm using .properties files to store messages in different languages.
Till now I was using Vscode built-in java compilation process which was copying .properties files into its corresponding directory in the output. However now I'd like to write a build script for that project.
My command looks like this:
javac -d ./bin -cp ./src ./src/**/*.java.
This command however doesn't take .properties files into account. I searched web whether javac has ability to somehow process/include this files into output but found no answer. I know I can use Maven or Ant, but I'd like to make this project without usage of additional tools.
Answering to my own question, but maybe someone will find this useful one day. In short javac always compiles .java files producing .class files. There is no way that it could process some other file (source:
How to set the output files when compiling with javac).
Long story short if you want to include resources, images, text files, anything that is not .java file in your output, and don't want to use build tools, you have to copy it manually or use cp command in your build script.
There doesn't seem to be any code there. I expected to see class declarations so I could see what the code does but instead there's some
Are they somehow precompiled? What's the difference between included Jar file and a pure code?
You are looking at .class file, which is a generated when you compile .java file. To see what the program does, you have to look into .java file. You can refer official java documentation for that.
A .jar file is packaged file with .jar extension, it contains compiled java files and their class files. This file is usually imported into projects to use the classes defined in that package.
You can use "jar xf jar-file" command in command-prompt/terminal to extract the files from jar and look into the package.
A JAR will normally contain compiled class files. It may also contain source files or there may be a separate JAR that contains the source files, but not necessarily so.
If you want to use the library in your project, then a JAR of compiled class files is what you want. If you want the source code, then you'll have to see if it is available from wherever you downloaded this from. If all you want is to see how to use the classes, then probably what you want are JavaDocs for the library you are using. This is an HTML based API documentation.
Well, this is because you haven't attached any source for the mentioned dnsns.jar. You can attach source to existing JAR files in Eclipse. Refer this SO post: Is there an easy way to attach source in Eclipse?
For this specific dnsns.jar, it is part of your JRE, and if you are not able to see its source in your IDE, then it means that the Java that you have setup in IDE lacks the source. If your installation does not have the source (src.zip), then you can get it manually as mentioned on this SO post: Where to find Java JDK Source Code?
EDIT: Alternatively, you can also use a decompiler (e.g. http://jd.benow.ca/) to reverse engineer the source from byte code, though, it may not be the exact match to the original source but you can understand the overall idea. You can add the decompiler as the default program for opening .class files in eclipse Windows > Preferences > General > Editors > File Associations. Select *.class filter and add your decompiler as the program. Though, it is not as clean as attaching the source to JAR, but may work if you don't have access to source.
EDIT2: About your question
What's the difference between included Jar file and a pure code
Eclipse can find .java files for your own code because obviously they are in your workspace. But when you add a JAR file as library, it may have the source (.java) in it or not. If the source is available, eclipse can display it by default. If not, you have to add it manually.
Uploaded a jar file from my computer to a server and tried to run it. When I run it I get java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError and it seems to be related to the twitter4j jar that my main method depends on.
However, I have this jar file in my libraries so shouldn't this be included when I build my code in to a jar? Here's a pic in case it helps.
is the error that I'm getting. (can't upload a pic just yet.
Not sure what this has to do with twitter, but anyway, the issue is that you do not have the correct class files. In other words, when you are running your fat JAR in the command prompt, you do not have any libraries exported with it (Or if you do, you don't have that specific one).
Sometimes such an error can be because there is an incorrect version of java, however that is not the case here since java has got no "twitter" packages or classes in it.
Using something like JarSplice would fix this.
Assuming you did not package the twitter4j classes inside your application jar, you need to tell Java where it can look for classes that are not inside your application jar. You typically use the classpath flag for that. In your case, it should look something like
java -cp /tmp/twitter4j.jar -jar /tmp/myapp.jar
An alternative would be to package all twitter4j's classes inside your application jar. This is called a 'fat' jar. How to make one depends on how you build your application jar.
The JAR file that you are trying to use needs to be in the classpath. This can be done by using the -cp attribute from the command line. However, when using java -jar, you cannot use the -cp attribute.
To get around this, you can do the following:
java -cp /tmp/myapp.jar;\path\to\external.jar com.example.package.MyClass
where MyClass has the main() method defined.
Alternately, you can specify jar files on the classpath using the manifest.mf file. See http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/deployment/jar/manifestindex.html for details.
As an intern, I use company code in my projects and they usually send me a jar file to work with. I add it to the build path in Eclipse and usually all is fine and dandy.
However, I got curious to know, what each class contained and when I try to open one of the classes in the jar file, it tells me that I need a source file.
What does this mean? I come from a C/C++ background so is a jar similar to an already compiled .o file and all I can see is the .h stuff? Or is there actual code in the jar file that I'm using that's encrypted so I can't read it?
Thanks for all the answers!
Edit: Thanks, guys, I knew it was a sort of like an archive but I was confused to why when I tried to open the .class files, I got a bunch of random characters. The output was similar when I tried to open a .o file in C so I just wanted to make sure.
Thanks!
A JAR file is actually just a ZIP file. It can contain anything - usually it contains compiled Java code (*.class), but sometimes also Java sourcecode (*.java).
However, Java can be decompiled - in case the developer obfuscated his code you won't get any useful class/function/variable names though.
However, I got curious to what each class contained and when I try to open one of the classes in the jar file, it tells me that I need a source file.
A jar file is basically a zip file containing .class files and potentially other resources (and metadata about the jar itself). It's hard to compare C to Java really, as Java byte code maintains a lot more metadata than most binary formats - but the class file is compiled code instead of source code.
If you either open the jar file with a zip utility or run jar xf foo.jar you can extract the files from it, and have a look at them. Note that you don't need a jar file to run Java code - classloaders can load class data directly from the file system, or from URLs, as well as from jar files.
The best way to understand what the jar file contains is by executing this :
Go to command line and execute jar tvf jarfilename.jar
A jar file is a zip file with some additional files containing metadata. (Despite the .jar extension, it is in zip format, and any utilities that deal with .zip files are also able to deal with .jar files.)
http://docs.oracle.com/javase/8/docs/technotes/guides/jar/index.html
Jar files can contain any kind of files, but they usually contain class files and supporting configuration files (properties), graphics and other data files needed by the application.
Class files contain compiled Java code, which is executable by the Java Virtual Machine.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Java_class_file
JAR stands for Java ARchive. It's a file format based on the popular ZIP file format and is used for aggregating many files into one. Although JAR can be used as a general archiving tool, the primary motivation for its development was so that Java applets and their requisite components (.class files, images and sounds) can be downloaded to a browser in a single HTTP transaction, rather than opening a new connection for each piece. This greatly improves the speed with which an applet can be loaded onto a web page and begin functioning. The JAR format also supports compression, which reduces the size of the file and improves download time still further. Additionally, individual entries in a JAR file may be digitally signed by the applet author to authenticate their origin.
Jar file contains compiled Java binary classes in the form of *.class which can be converted to readable .java class by decompiling it using some open source decompiler. The jar also has an optional META-INF/MANIFEST.MF which tells us how to use the jar file - specifies other jar files for loading with the jar.
Jar( Java Archive) contains group of .class files.
1.To create Jar File (Zip File)
if one .class (say, Demo.class) then use command jar -cvf NameOfJarFile.jar Demo.class (usually it’s not feasible for only one .class file)
if more than one .class (say, Demo.class , DemoOne.class) then use command jar -cvf NameOfJarFile.jar Demo.class DemoOne.class
if all .class is to be group (say, Demo.class , DemoOne.class etc) then use command jar -cvf NameOfJarFile.jar *.class
2.To extract Jar File (Unzip File)
jar -xvf NameOfJarFile.jar
3.To display table of content
jar -tvf NameOfJarFile.jar
A .jar file is akin to a .exe file.
In essence, they are both executable files.
A jar file is also a archive (JAR = Java ARchive). In a jar file, you will see folders and class files. Each .class file is similar to a .o you might get from C or C++, and is a compiled java archive.
If you wanted to see the code in a jar file, download a java decompiler (located here: http://java.decompiler.free.fr/?q=jdgui) and a .jar extractor (7zip works fine).
JD-GUI is a very handy tool for browsing and decompiling JARs
A .jar file contains compiled code (*.class files) and other data/resources related to that code. It enables you to bundle multiple files into a single archive file. It also contains metadata. Since it is a zip file it is capable of compressing the data that you put into it.
Couple of things i found useful.
http://www.skylit.com/javamethods/faqs/createjar.html
http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/deployment/jar/basicsindex.html
The book OSGi in practice defines JAR files as, "JARs are archive files based on the ZIP file format,
allowing many files to be aggregated into a single file. Typically the files
contained in the archive are a mixture of compiled Java class files and resource
files such as images and documents. Additionally the specification defines a
standard location within a JAR archive for metadata — the META-INF folder
— and several standard file names and formats within that directly, most
important of which is the MANIFEST.MF file."
Just check if the aopalliance.jar file has .java files instead of .class files. if so, just extract the jar file, import it in eclipse & create a jar though eclipse. It worked for me.
While learning about JAR, I came across this thread, but couldn't get enough information for people like me, who have .NET background, so I'm gonna add few points which can help persons like myself with .NET background.
First we need to define similar concept to JAR in .NET which is Assembly and assembly shares a lot in common with Java JAR files.
So, an assembly is the fundamental unit of code packaging in the .NET environment. Assemblies are self contained and typically contain the intermediate code from compiling classes, metadata about the classes, and any other files needed by the packaged code to perform its task. Since assemblies are the fundamental unit of code packaging, several actions related to interacting with types must be done at the assembly level. For instance, granting of security permissions, code deployment, and versioning are done at the assembly level.
Java JAR files perform a similar task in Java with most differences being in the implementation. Assemblies are usually stored as EXEs or DLLs while JAR files are stored in the ZIP file format.
Source of Information -> 5- Assemblies
Please any one give me the suggestion for this. I'm having the Xerces-J-source.zip file and I need to convert to Xerces-J-source.jar file.
Generally if your ZIP contains the class files (And not the sources):
Just rename the file, a jar is a zip file. But if you're aiming for a class to be launched with command java -jar myProject.jar you should create a MANIFEST file containing the main-class and libraries to use in the classpath.
So in your case since you got the sources (Java file), you'll have to compile classes and create the JAR. Eclipse has an Export as JAR feature if you use it.
That doesn't make any sense. If you need Xerces-J the better is download the jars from the website.
If you want the get the jar form the source, you need to compile it, but there is no need when you can download it.