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766 lines
34 KiB
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766 lines
34 KiB
HTML
<!--
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Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one or more
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contributor license agreements. See the NOTICE file distributed with
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this work for additional information regarding copyright ownership.
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The ASF licenses this file to You under the Apache License, Version 2.0
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(the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with
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the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at
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http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
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Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
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distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
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WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
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See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
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limitations under the License.
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-->
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<html>
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<head>
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<meta http-equiv="Content-Language" content="en-us">
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<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="stylesheets/style.css">
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<title>Writing a Simple Buildfile</title>
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</head>
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<body>
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<h1>Using Ant</h1>
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<h2><a name="buildfile">Writing a Simple Buildfile</a></h2>
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<p>Ant's buildfiles are written in XML. Each buildfile contains one project
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and at least one (default) target. Targets contain task elements.
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Each task element of the buildfile can have an <code>id</code> attribute and
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can later be referred to by the value supplied to this. The value has
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to be unique. (For additional information, see the
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<a href="#tasks"> Tasks</a> section below.)</p>
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<h3><a name="projects">Projects</a></h3>
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<p>A <i>project</i> has three attributes:</p>
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<table border="1" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0">
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<tr>
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<td valign="top"><b>Attribute</b></td>
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<td valign="top"><b>Description</b></td>
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<td align="center" valign="top"><b>Required</b></td>
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</tr>
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<tr>
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<td valign="top">name</td>
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<td valign="top">the name of the project.</td>
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<td align="center" valign="top">No</td>
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</tr>
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<tr>
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<td valign="top">default</td>
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<td valign="top">the default target to use when no target is supplied.</td>
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<td align="center" valign="top">No; however, <b>since Ant 1.6.0</b>,
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every project includes an implicit target that contains any and
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all top-level tasks and/or types. This target will always be
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executed as part of the project's initialization, even when Ant is
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run with the <a href="running.html#options">-projecthelp</a> option.
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</td>
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</tr>
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<tr>
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<td valign="top">basedir</td>
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<td valign="top">the base directory from which all path calculations are
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done. This attribute might be overridden by setting
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the "basedir"
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property beforehand. When this is done, it must be omitted in the
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project tag. If neither the attribute nor the property have
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been set, the parent directory of the buildfile will be used.</td>
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<td align="center" valign="top">No</td>
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</tr>
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</table>
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<p>Optionally, a description for the project can be provided as a
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top-level <code><description></code> element (see the <a
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href="CoreTypes/description.html">description</a> type).</p>
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<p>Each project defines one or more <i>targets</i>.
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A target is a set of <i>tasks</i> you want
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to be executed. When starting Ant, you can select which target(s) you
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want to have executed. When no target is given,
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the project's default is used.</p>
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<h3><a name="targets">Targets</a></h3>
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<p>A target can depend on other targets. You might have a target for compiling,
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for example, and a target for creating a distributable. You can only build a
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distributable when you have compiled first, so the distribute target
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<i>depends on</i> the compile target. Ant resolves these dependencies.</p>
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<p>It should be noted, however, that Ant's <code>depends</code> attribute
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only specifies the <i>order</i> in which targets should be executed - it
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does not affect whether the target that specifies the dependency(s) gets
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executed if the dependent target(s) did not (need to) run.
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</p>
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<p>Ant tries to execute the targets in the <code>depends</code>
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attribute in the order
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they appear (from left to right). Keep in mind that it is possible that a target
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can get executed earlier when an earlier target depends on it:</p>
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<blockquote>
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<pre><target name="A"/>
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<target name="B" depends="A"/>
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<target name="C" depends="B"/>
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<target name="D" depends="C,B,A"/></pre>
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</blockquote>
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<p>Suppose we want to execute target D. From its
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<code>depends</code> attribute, you
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might think that first target C, then B and then A is executed.
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Wrong! C depends on B, and B depends on A, so first A is executed, then B, then C, and finally D.</p>
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<p>In a chain of dependencies stretching back from a given target such
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as D above, each target gets executed only once, even when more than
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one target depends on it. Thus, executing the D target will first
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result in C being called, which in turn will first call B, which in
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turn will first call A. After A, then B, then C have executed,
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execution returns to the dependency list of D, which will <u>not</u>
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call B and A, since they were already called in process of dependency
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resolution for C and B respectively as dependencies of D. Had no such
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dependencies been discovered in processing C and B, B and A would
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have been executed after C in processing D's dependency list.</p>
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<p>A target also has the ability to perform its execution if (or
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unless) a property has been set. This allows, for example, better
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control on the building process depending on the state of the system
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(java version, OS, command-line property defines, etc.). To make a target
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<i>sense</i> this property, you should add the <code>if</code> (or
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<code>unless</code>) attribute with the name of the property that the target
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should react to. <strong>Note:</strong> Ant will only check whether
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the property has been set, the value doesn't matter. A property set
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to the empty string is still an existing property. For example:</p>
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<blockquote>
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<pre><target name="build-module-A" if="module-A-present"/></pre>
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<pre><target name="build-own-fake-module-A" unless="module-A-present"/></pre>
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</blockquote>
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<p>In the first example, if the <code>module-A-present</code>
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property is set (to any value, e.g. <i>false</i>), the target will be run. In the second
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example, if the <code>module-A-present</code> property is set
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(again, to any value), the target will not be run.
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</p>
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<p>Only one propertyname can be specified in the if/unless clause. If you want to check
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multiple conditions, you can use a dependend target for computing the result for the check:</p>
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<blockquote><pre>
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<target name="myTarget" depends="myTarget.check" if="myTarget.run">
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<echo>Files foo.txt and bar.txt are present.</echo>
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</target>
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<target name="myTarget.check">
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<condition property="myTarget.run">
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<and>
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<available file="foo.txt"/>
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<available file="bar.txt"/>
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</and>
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</condition>
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</target>
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</pre></blockquote>
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<p>If no <code>if</code> and no <code>unless</code> attribute is present,
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the target will always be executed.</p>
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<p>
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<b>Important:</b> the <code>if</code> and <code>unless</code> attributes only
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enable or disable the target to which they are attached. They do not control
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whether or not targets that a conditional target depends upon get executed.
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In fact, they do not even get evaluated until the target is about to be executed,
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and all its predecessors have already run.
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<p>The optional <code>description</code> attribute can be used to provide a one-line description of this target, which is printed by the
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<nobr><code>-projecthelp</code></nobr> command-line option. Targets
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without such a description are deemed internal and will not be listed,
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unless either the <nobr><code>-verbose</code></nobr> or
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<nobr><code>-debug</code></nobr> option is used.
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</p>
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<p>It is a good practice to place your <a
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href="CoreTasks/tstamp.html">tstamp</a> tasks in a so-called
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<i>initialization</i> target, on which
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all other targets depend. Make sure that target is always the first one in
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the depends list of the other targets. In this manual, most initialization targets
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have the name <code>"init"</code>.</p>
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<p>If the depends attribute and the if/unless attribute are set, the depends attribute is
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executed first.</p>
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<p>A target has the following attributes:</p>
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<table border="1" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0">
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<tr>
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<td valign="top"><b>Attribute</b></td>
|
|
<td valign="top"><b>Description</b></td>
|
|
<td align="center" valign="top"><b>Required</b></td>
|
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</tr>
|
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<tr>
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|
<td valign="top">name</td>
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<td valign="top">the name of the target.</td>
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<td align="center" valign="top">Yes</td>
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</tr>
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<tr>
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|
<td valign="top">depends</td>
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<td valign="top">a comma-separated list of names of targets on which this
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target depends.</td>
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<td align="center" valign="top">No</td>
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</tr>
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<tr>
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<td valign="top">if</td>
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<td valign="top">the name of the property that must be set in order for this
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target to execute.</td>
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<td align="center" valign="top">No</td>
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</tr>
|
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<tr>
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<td valign="top">unless</td>
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<td valign="top">the name of the property that must not be set in order
|
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for this target to execute.</td>
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<td align="center" valign="top">No</td>
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</tr>
|
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<tr>
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<td valign="top">description</td>
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<td valign="top">a short description of this target's function.</td>
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<td align="center" valign="top">No</td>
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</tr>
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</table>
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</p>
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<p>A target name can be any alphanumeric string valid in the encoding of the XML
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file. The empty string "" is in this set, as is
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comma "," and space " ".
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Please avoid using these, as they will not be supported in future Ant versions
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because of all the confusion they cause. IDE support of unusual target names,
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or any target name containing spaces, varies with the IDE.</p>
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<p>Targets beginning with a hyphen such as <code>"-restart"</code>
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are valid, and can be used
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to name targets that should not be called directly from the command line.</p>
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<h3><a name="tasks">Tasks</a></h3>
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<p>A task is a piece of code that can be executed.</p>
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<p>A task can have multiple attributes (or arguments, if you prefer). The value
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of an attribute might contain references to a property. These references will be
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resolved before the task is executed.</p>
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<p>Tasks have a common structure:</p>
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|
<blockquote>
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<pre><<i>name</i> <i>attribute1</i>="<i>value1</i>" <i>attribute2</i>="<i>value2</i>" ... /></pre>
|
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</blockquote>
|
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<p>where <i>name</i> is the name of the task,
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<i>attributeN</i> is the attribute name, and
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<i>valueN</i> is the value for this attribute.</p>
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<p>There is a set of <a href="coretasklist.html" target="navFrame">built-in tasks</a>, along with a
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number of
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<a href="optionaltasklist.html" target="navFrame"> optional tasks</a>, but it is also very
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easy to <a href="develop.html#writingowntask">write your own</a>.</p>
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<p>All tasks share a task name attribute. The value of
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this attribute will be used in the logging messages generated by
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Ant.</p>
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Tasks can be assigned an <code>id</code> attribute:
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<blockquote>
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<pre><<i>taskname</i> id="<i>taskID</i>" ... /></pre>
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</blockquote>
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where <i>taskname</i> is the name of the task, and <i>taskID</i> is
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a unique identifier for this task.
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You can refer to the
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corresponding task object in scripts or other tasks via this name.
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For example, in scripts you could do:
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|
<blockquote>
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<pre>
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<script ... >
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task1.setFoo("bar");
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</script>
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</pre>
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</blockquote>
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to set the <code>foo</code> attribute of this particular task instance.
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In another task (written in Java), you can access the instance via
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<code>project.getReference("task1")</code>.
|
|
<p>
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Note<sup>1</sup>: If "task1" has not been run yet, then
|
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it has not been configured (ie., no attributes have been set), and if it is
|
|
going to be configured later, anything you've done to the instance may
|
|
be overwritten.
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|
</p>
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|
<p>
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Note<sup>2</sup>: Future versions of Ant will most likely <i>not</i>
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be backward-compatible with this behaviour, since there will likely be no
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task instances at all, only proxies.
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</p>
|
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<h3><a name="properties">Properties</a></h3>
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|
<p>A project can have a set of properties. These might be set in the buildfile
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|
by the <a href="CoreTasks/property.html">property</a> task, or might be set outside Ant. A
|
|
property has a name and a value; the name is case-sensitive. Properties may be used in the value of
|
|
task attributes. This is done by placing the property name between
|
|
"<code>${</code>" and "<code>}</code>" in the
|
|
attribute value. For example,
|
|
if there is a "builddir" property with the value
|
|
"build", then this could be used in an attribute like this:
|
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<code>${builddir}/classes</code>.
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This is resolved at run-time as <code>build/classes</code>.</p>
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<p>In the event you should need to include this construct literally
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(i.e. without property substitutions), simply "escape" the '$' character
|
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by doubling it. To continue the previous example:
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<pre> <echo>$${builddir}=${builddir}</echo></pre>
|
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will echo this message:
|
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<pre> ${builddir}=build/classes</pre></p>
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<p>In order to maintain backward compatibility with older Ant releases,
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a single '$' character encountered apart from a property-like construct
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(including a matched pair of french braces) will be interpreted literally;
|
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that is, as '$'. The "correct" way to specify this literal character,
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however, is by using the escaping mechanism unconditionally, so that "$$"
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is obtained by specifying "$$$$". Mixing the two approaches yields
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unpredictable results, as "$$$" results in "$$".</p>
|
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<h3><a name="built-in-props">Built-in Properties</a></h3>
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<p>Ant provides access to all system properties as if they had been
|
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defined using a <code><property></code> task.
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|
For example, <code>${os.name}</code> expands to the
|
|
name of the operating system.</p>
|
|
<p>For a list of system properties see
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<a href="http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.3/docs/api/java/lang/System.html#getProperties()">the Javadoc of System.getProperties</a>.
|
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</p>
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<p>In addition, Ant has some built-in properties:</p>
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<pre>
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basedir the absolute path of the project's basedir (as set
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with the basedir attribute of <a href="#projects"><project>)</a>.
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ant.file the absolute path of the buildfile.
|
|
ant.version the version of Ant
|
|
ant.project.name the name of the project that is currently executing;
|
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it is set in the name attribute of <project>.
|
|
ant.project.default-target
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the name of the currently executing project's
|
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default target; it is set via the default
|
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attribute of <project>.
|
|
ant.project.invoked-targets
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a comma separated list of the targets that have
|
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been specified on the command line (the IDE,
|
|
an <ant> task ...) when invoking the current
|
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project.
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ant.java.version the JVM version Ant detected; currently it can hold
|
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the values "1.2", "1.3",
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"1.4", "1.5" and "1.6".
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ant.core.lib the absolute path of the <code>ant.jar</code> file.
|
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</pre>
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<p>There is also another property, but this is set by the launcher script and therefore
|
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maybe not set inside IDEs:</p>
|
|
<pre>
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ant.home home directory of Ant
|
|
</pre>
|
|
<p>The following property is only set if Ant is started via the
|
|
Launcher class (which means it may not be set inside IDEs
|
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either):</p>
|
|
<pre>
|
|
ant.library.dir the directory that has been used to load Ant's
|
|
jars from. In most cases this is ANT_HOME/lib.
|
|
</pre>
|
|
|
|
<a name="propertyHelper"><h3>Property Helpers</h3></a>
|
|
Ant's property handling is accomplished by an instance of
|
|
<code>org.apache.tools.ant.PropertyHelper</code> associated with the current Project.
|
|
You can learn more about this class by examining Ant's Java API. In Ant 1.8 the
|
|
PropertyHelper class was much reworked and now itself employs a number of helper
|
|
classes (actually instances of the <code>org.apache.tools.ant.PropertyHelper$Delegate</code>
|
|
marker interface) to take care of discrete tasks such as property setting, retrieval,
|
|
parsing, etc. This makes Ant's property handling highly extensible; also of interest is the
|
|
new <a href="CoreTasks/propertyhelper.html">propertyhelper</a> task used to manipulate the
|
|
PropertyHelper and its delegates from the context of the Ant buildfile.
|
|
|
|
<a name="example"><h3>Example Buildfile</h3></a>
|
|
<pre>
|
|
<project name="MyProject" default="dist" basedir=".">
|
|
<description>
|
|
simple example build file
|
|
</description>
|
|
<!-- set global properties for this build -->
|
|
<property name="src" location="src"/>
|
|
<property name="build" location="build"/>
|
|
<property name="dist" location="dist"/>
|
|
|
|
<target name="init">
|
|
<!-- Create the time stamp -->
|
|
<tstamp/>
|
|
<!-- Create the build directory structure used by compile -->
|
|
<mkdir dir="${build}"/>
|
|
</target>
|
|
|
|
<target name="compile" depends="init"
|
|
description="compile the source " >
|
|
<!-- Compile the java code from ${src} into ${build} -->
|
|
<javac srcdir="${src}" destdir="${build}"/>
|
|
</target>
|
|
|
|
<target name="dist" depends="compile"
|
|
description="generate the distribution" >
|
|
<!-- Create the distribution directory -->
|
|
<mkdir dir="${dist}/lib"/>
|
|
|
|
<!-- Put everything in ${build} into the MyProject-${DSTAMP}.jar file -->
|
|
<jar jarfile="${dist}/lib/MyProject-${DSTAMP}.jar" basedir="${build}"/>
|
|
</target>
|
|
|
|
<target name="clean"
|
|
description="clean up" >
|
|
<!-- Delete the ${build} and ${dist} directory trees -->
|
|
<delete dir="${build}"/>
|
|
<delete dir="${dist}"/>
|
|
</target>
|
|
</project>
|
|
</pre>
|
|
|
|
<p>Notice that we are declaring properties outside any target. As of
|
|
Ant 1.6 all tasks can be declared outside targets (earlier version
|
|
only allowed <tt><property></tt>,<tt><typedef></tt> and
|
|
<tt><taskdef></tt>). When you do this they are evaluated before
|
|
any targets are executed. Some tasks will generate build failures if
|
|
they are used outside of targets as they may cause infinite loops
|
|
otherwise (<code><antcall></code> for example).</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
We have given some targets descriptions; this causes the <tt>projecthelp</tt>
|
|
invocation option to list them as public targets with the descriptions; the
|
|
other target is internal and not listed.
|
|
<p>
|
|
Finally, for this target to work the source in the <tt>src</tt> subdirectory
|
|
should be stored in a directory tree which matches the package names. Check the
|
|
<tt><javac></tt> task for details.
|
|
|
|
<a name="filters"><h3>Token Filters</h3></a>
|
|
<p>A project can have a set of tokens that might be automatically expanded if
|
|
found when a file is copied, when the filtering-copy behavior is selected in the
|
|
tasks that support this. These might be set in the buildfile
|
|
by the <a href="CoreTasks/filter.html">filter</a> task.</p>
|
|
<p>Since this can potentially be a very harmful behavior,
|
|
the tokens in the files <b>must</b>
|
|
be of the form <code>@</code><i>token</i><code>@</code>, where
|
|
<i>token</i> is the token name that is set
|
|
in the <code><filter></code> task. This token syntax matches the syntax of other build systems
|
|
that perform such filtering and remains sufficiently orthogonal to most
|
|
programming and scripting languages, as well as with documentation systems.</p>
|
|
<p>Note: If a token with the format <code>@</code><i>token</i><code>@</code>
|
|
is found in a file, but no
|
|
filter is associated with that token, no changes take place;
|
|
therefore, no escaping
|
|
method is available - but as long as you choose appropriate names for your
|
|
tokens, this should not cause problems.</p>
|
|
<p><b>Warning:</b> If you copy binary files with filtering turned on, you can corrupt the
|
|
files. This feature should be used with text files <em>only</em>.</p>
|
|
|
|
<h3><a name="path">Path-like Structures</a></h3>
|
|
<p>You can specify <code>PATH</code>- and <code>CLASSPATH</code>-type
|
|
references using both
|
|
"<code>:</code>" and "<code>;</code>" as separator
|
|
characters. Ant will
|
|
convert the separator to the correct character of the current operating
|
|
system.</p>
|
|
<p>Wherever path-like values need to be specified, a nested element can
|
|
be used. This takes the general form of:</p>
|
|
<pre>
|
|
<classpath>
|
|
<pathelement path="${classpath}"/>
|
|
<pathelement location="lib/helper.jar"/>
|
|
</classpath>
|
|
</pre>
|
|
<p>The <code>location</code> attribute specifies a single file or
|
|
directory relative to the project's base directory (or an absolute
|
|
filename), while the <code>path</code> attribute accepts colon-
|
|
or semicolon-separated lists of locations. The <code>path</code>
|
|
attribute is intended to be used with predefined paths - in any other
|
|
case, multiple elements with <code>location</code> attributes should be
|
|
preferred.</p>
|
|
<p>As a shortcut, the <code><classpath></code> tag
|
|
supports <code>path</code> and
|
|
<code>location</code> attributes of its own, so:</p>
|
|
<pre>
|
|
<classpath>
|
|
<pathelement path="${classpath}"/>
|
|
</classpath>
|
|
</pre>
|
|
<p>can be abbreviated to:</p>
|
|
<pre>
|
|
<classpath path="${classpath}"/>
|
|
</pre>
|
|
<p>In addition, one or more
|
|
<a href="CoreTypes/resources.html#collection">Resource Collection</a>s
|
|
can be specified as nested elements (these must consist of
|
|
<a href="CoreTypes/resources.html#file">file</a>-type resources only).
|
|
Additionally, it should be noted that although resource collections are
|
|
processed in the order encountered, certain resource collection types
|
|
such as <a href="CoreTypes/fileset.html">fileset</a>,
|
|
<a href="CoreTypes/dirset.html">dirset</a> and
|
|
<a href="CoreTypes/resources.html#files">files</a>
|
|
are undefined in terms of order.</p>
|
|
<pre>
|
|
<classpath>
|
|
<pathelement path="${classpath}"/>
|
|
<fileset dir="lib">
|
|
<include name="**/*.jar"/>
|
|
</fileset>
|
|
<pathelement location="classes"/>
|
|
<dirset dir="${build.dir}">
|
|
<include name="apps/**/classes"/>
|
|
<exclude name="apps/**/*Test*"/>
|
|
</dirset>
|
|
<filelist refid="third-party_jars"/>
|
|
</classpath>
|
|
</pre>
|
|
<p>This builds a path that holds the value of <code>${classpath}</code>,
|
|
followed by all jar files in the <code>lib</code> directory,
|
|
the <code>classes</code> directory, all directories named
|
|
<code>classes</code> under the <code>apps</code> subdirectory of
|
|
<code>${build.dir}</code>, except those
|
|
that have the text <code>Test</code> in their name, and
|
|
the files specified in the referenced FileList.</p>
|
|
<p>If you want to use the same path-like structure for several tasks,
|
|
you can define them with a <code><path></code> element at the
|
|
same level as <i>target</i>s, and reference them via their
|
|
<i>id</i> attribute--see <a href="#references">References</a> for an
|
|
example.</p>
|
|
<p>A path-like structure can include a reference to another path-like
|
|
structure (a path being itself a resource collection)
|
|
via nested <code><path></code> elements:</p>
|
|
<pre>
|
|
<path id="base.path">
|
|
<pathelement path="${classpath}"/>
|
|
<fileset dir="lib">
|
|
<include name="**/*.jar"/>
|
|
</fileset>
|
|
<pathelement location="classes"/>
|
|
</path>
|
|
|
|
<path id="tests.path">
|
|
<path refid="base.path"/>
|
|
<pathelement location="testclasses"/>
|
|
</path>
|
|
</pre>
|
|
The shortcuts previously mentioned for <code><classpath></code> are also valid for <code><path></code>.For example:
|
|
<pre>
|
|
<path id="base.path">
|
|
<pathelement path="${classpath}"/>
|
|
</path>
|
|
</pre>
|
|
can be written as:
|
|
<pre>
|
|
<path id="base.path" path="${classpath}"/>
|
|
</pre>
|
|
|
|
<h4><a name="pathshortcut">Path Shortcut</a></h4>
|
|
<p>
|
|
In Ant 1.6 a shortcut for converting paths to OS specific strings
|
|
in properties has been added. One can use the expression
|
|
${toString:<em>pathreference</em>} to convert a path element
|
|
reference to a string that can be used for a path argument.
|
|
For example:
|
|
</p>
|
|
<pre>
|
|
<path id="lib.path.ref">
|
|
<fileset dir="lib" includes="*.jar"/>
|
|
</path>
|
|
<javac srcdir="src" destdir="classes">
|
|
<compilerarg arg="-Xbootstrap/p:${toString:lib.path.ref}"/>
|
|
</javac>
|
|
</pre>
|
|
|
|
|
|
<h3><a name="arg">Command-line Arguments</a></h3>
|
|
<p>Several tasks take arguments that will be passed to another
|
|
process on the command line. To make it easier to specify arguments
|
|
that contain space characters, nested <code>arg</code> elements can be used.</p>
|
|
<table border="1" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0">
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td width="12%" valign="top"><b>Attribute</b></td>
|
|
<td width="78%" valign="top"><b>Description</b></td>
|
|
<td width="10%" valign="top"><b>Required</b></td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td valign="top">value</td>
|
|
<td valign="top">a single command-line argument; can contain space
|
|
characters.</td>
|
|
<td align="center" rowspan="5">Exactly one of these.</td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td valign="top">file</td>
|
|
<td valign="top">The name of a file as a single command-line
|
|
argument; will be replaced with the absolute filename of the file.</td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td valign="top">path</td>
|
|
<td valign="top">A string that will be treated as a path-like
|
|
string as a single command-line argument; you can use <code>;</code>
|
|
or <code>:</code> as
|
|
path separators and Ant will convert it to the platform's local
|
|
conventions.</td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td valign="top">pathref</td>
|
|
<td valign="top"><a href="#references">Reference</a> to a path
|
|
defined elsewhere. Ant will convert it to the platform's local
|
|
conventions.</td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td valign="top">line</td>
|
|
<td valign="top">a space-delimited list of command-line arguments.</td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td valign="top">prefix</td>
|
|
<td valign="top">A fixed string to be placed in front of the
|
|
argument. In the case of a line broken into parts, it will be
|
|
placed in front of every part. <em>Since Ant 1.8.</em></td>
|
|
<td valign="top" align="center">No</td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td valign="top">suffix</td>
|
|
<td valign="top">A fixed string to be placed immediately after the
|
|
argument. In the case of a line broken into parts, it will be
|
|
placed after every part. <em>Since Ant 1.8.</em></td>
|
|
<td valign="top" align="center">No</td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
</table>
|
|
|
|
<p>It is highly recommended to avoid the <code>line</code> version
|
|
when possible. Ant will try to split the command line in a way
|
|
similar to what a (Unix) shell would do, but may create something that
|
|
is very different from what you expect under some circumstances.</p>
|
|
|
|
<h4>Examples</h4>
|
|
<blockquote><pre>
|
|
<arg value="-l -a"/>
|
|
</pre></blockquote>
|
|
<p>is a single command-line argument containing a space character,
|
|
<i>not</i> separate commands "-l" and "-a".</p>
|
|
<blockquote><pre>
|
|
<arg line="-l -a"/>
|
|
</pre></blockquote>
|
|
<p>This is a command line with two separate arguments, "-l" and "-a".</p>
|
|
<blockquote><pre>
|
|
<arg path="/dir;/dir2:\dir3"/>
|
|
</pre></blockquote>
|
|
<p>is a single command-line argument with the value
|
|
<code>\dir;\dir2;\dir3</code> on DOS-based systems and
|
|
<code>/dir:/dir2:/dir3</code> on Unix-like systems.</p>
|
|
|
|
<h3><a name="references">References</a></h3>
|
|
|
|
<p>Any project element can be assigned an identifier using its
|
|
<code>id</code> attribute. In most cases the element can subsequently
|
|
be referenced by specifying the <code>refid</code> attribute on an
|
|
element of the same type. This can be useful if you are going to
|
|
replicate the same snippet of XML over and over again--using a
|
|
<code><classpath></code> structure more than once, for example.</p>
|
|
<p>The following example:</p>
|
|
<blockquote><pre>
|
|
<project ... >
|
|
<target ... >
|
|
<rmic ...>
|
|
<classpath>
|
|
<pathelement location="lib/"/>
|
|
<pathelement path="${java.class.path}/"/>
|
|
<pathelement path="${additional.path}"/>
|
|
</classpath>
|
|
</rmic>
|
|
</target>
|
|
|
|
<target ... >
|
|
<javac ...>
|
|
<classpath>
|
|
<pathelement location="lib/"/>
|
|
<pathelement path="${java.class.path}/"/>
|
|
<pathelement path="${additional.path}"/>
|
|
</classpath>
|
|
</javac>
|
|
</target>
|
|
</project>
|
|
</pre></blockquote>
|
|
<p>could be rewritten as:</p>
|
|
<blockquote><pre>
|
|
<project ... >
|
|
<path id="project.class.path">
|
|
<pathelement location="lib/"/>
|
|
<pathelement path="${java.class.path}/"/>
|
|
<pathelement path="${additional.path}"/>
|
|
</path>
|
|
|
|
<target ... >
|
|
<rmic ...>
|
|
<classpath refid="project.class.path"/>
|
|
</rmic>
|
|
</target>
|
|
|
|
<target ... >
|
|
<javac ...>
|
|
<classpath refid="project.class.path"/>
|
|
</javac>
|
|
</target>
|
|
</project>
|
|
</pre></blockquote>
|
|
<p>All tasks that use nested elements for
|
|
<a href="CoreTypes/patternset.html">PatternSet</a>s,
|
|
<a href="CoreTypes/fileset.html">FileSet</a>s,
|
|
<a href="CoreTypes/zipfileset.html">ZipFileSet</a>s or
|
|
<a href="#path">path-like structures</a> accept references to these structures
|
|
as shown in the examples. Using <code>refid</code> on a task will ordinarily
|
|
have the same effect (referencing a task already declared), but the user
|
|
should be aware that the interpretation of this attribute is dependent on the
|
|
implementation of the element upon which it is specified. Some tasks (the
|
|
<a href="CoreTasks/property.html">property</a> task is a handy example)
|
|
deliberately assign a different meaning to <code>refid</code>.</p>
|
|
|
|
|
|
<h3><a name="toString">Getting the value of a Reference with ${toString:}</a></h3>
|
|
<p>
|
|
Any Ant type which has been declared with a reference can also its string
|
|
value extracted by using the <code>${toString:}</code> operation,
|
|
with the name of the reference listed after the <code>toString:</code> text.
|
|
The <code>toString()</code> method of the Java class instance that is
|
|
referenced is invoked -all built in types strive to produce useful and relevant
|
|
output in such an instance.
|
|
</p>
|
|
<p>
|
|
For example, here is how to get a listing of the files in a fileset,
|
|
<p>
|
|
<pre>
|
|
<fileset id="sourcefiles" dir="src" includes="**/*.java" />
|
|
<echo> sourcefiles = ${toString:sourcefiles} </echo>
|
|
</pre>
|
|
<p>
|
|
There is no guarantee that external types provide meaningful information in such
|
|
a situation</p>
|
|
|
|
|
|
<h3><a name="external-tasks">Use of external tasks</a></h3>
|
|
Ant supports a plugin mechanism for using third party tasks. For using them you
|
|
have to do two steps:
|
|
<ol>
|
|
<li>place their implementation somewhere where Ant can find them</li>
|
|
<li>declare them.</li>
|
|
</ol>
|
|
Don't add anything to the CLASSPATH environment variable - this is often the
|
|
reason for very obscure errors. Use Ant's own <a href="install.html#optionalTasks">mechanisms</a>
|
|
for adding libraries:
|
|
<ul>
|
|
<li>via command line argument <code>-lib</code></li>
|
|
<li>adding to <code>${user.home}/.ant/lib</code></li>
|
|
<li>adding to <code>${ant.home}/lib</code></li>
|
|
</ul>
|
|
For the declaration there are several ways:
|
|
<ul>
|
|
<li>declare a single task per using instruction using
|
|
<code><<a href="CoreTasks/taskdef.html">taskdef</a> name="taskname"
|
|
classname="ImplementationClass"/></code>
|
|
<br>
|
|
<code><taskdef name="for" classname="net.sf.antcontrib.logic.For" />
|
|
<for ... /></code>
|
|
</li>
|
|
<li>declare a bundle of tasks using a properties-file holding these
|
|
taskname-ImplementationClass-pairs and <code><taskdef></code>
|
|
<br>
|
|
<code><taskdef resource="net/sf/antcontrib/antcontrib.properties" />
|
|
<for ... /></code>
|
|
</li>
|
|
<li>declare a bundle of tasks using a <a href="CoreTypes/antlib.html">xml-file</a> holding these
|
|
taskname-ImplementationClass-pairs and <code><taskdef></code>
|
|
<br>
|
|
<code><taskdef resource="net/sf/antcontrib/antlib.xml" />
|
|
<for ... /></code>
|
|
</li>
|
|
<li>declare a bundle of tasks using a xml-file named antlib.xml, XML-namespace and
|
|
<a href="CoreTypes/antlib.html#antlibnamespace"><code>antlib:</code> protocoll handler</a>
|
|
<br>
|
|
<code><project xmlns:ac="antlib:net.sf.antconrib"/>
|
|
<ac:for ... /></code>
|
|
</li>
|
|
</ul>
|
|
|
|
If you need a special function, you should
|
|
<ol>
|
|
<li>have a look at this manual, because Ant provides lot of tasks</li>
|
|
<li>have a look at the external task page in the <a href="../external.html">manual</a>
|
|
(or better <a href="http://ant.apache.org/external.html">online</a>)</li>
|
|
<li>have a look at the external task <a href="http://wiki.apache.org/ant/AntExternalTaskdefs">wiki
|
|
page</a></li>
|
|
<li>ask on the <a href="http://ant.apache.org/mail.html#User%20List">Ant user</a> list</li>
|
|
<li><a href="tutorial-writing-tasks.html">implement </a>(and share) your own</li>
|
|
</ol>
|
|
|
|
</body>
|
|
</html>
|