Creating Custom Ant Build Files for an Application

If you perform the build process from the command line, Workshop for WebLogic will export an Ant script that duplicates the standard, IDE-based application build. You can then do command line builds using the Ant script. Note that modifying the generated Ant script does not alter the build process within Workshop for WebLogic.

Ant Build Script Functionality

The exported Ant script contains a set of standard targets for building, assembling, staging and generating module archives. You can view the targets supported for a specific script with the command ant -projecthelp. The functionality of these targets is detailed in the following table.

Supported Ant Targets

Target	Dependencies	Details
build		Compiles the source files; does not package the results. The target in an EAR project's Ant script builds all child module projects in dependency order.
assemble	build(a formal dependency does not exist on "build" but that target must be called prior to assemble)	Assembles the project for iterative dev deployment; requires that the "ear.root" property is specified. The target in an EAR project's Ant script assembles all child module projects.
stage	build(a formal dependency does not exist on "build" but that target must be called prior to stage)	Copies all of project's resources and build artifacts into a form that's ready for archive creation; staging directory can be overridden via the "staging.dir" property. The target in an EAR project's Ant script stages all child module projects.
archive	stage	Creates an archive containing all projects's resources and build artifacts; archive name and location can be overridden via the "archive.path" property. Note that the archive target builds an EAR file if run from an EAR script; if run from an Ant script generated from a web project, it generates a WAR file.
clean		Removes the files and directories generated by the build target

Workspace Metadata File

If you want to run your Ant scripts on a remote machine that does not have access to the workspace, you must first generate a workspace metadata file

This file lets you relativize absolute paths in the workspace's .metadata directory, including:

the WebLogic home directory
the workspace directory
the Java home directory

Variables defined in the workspace metadata file need to be passed to the ant script at runtime using the -D syntax.

Generating Ant Build Scripts

To Export Ant Build Scripts and (Optionally) a Workspace Metadata File

Select File > Export > Ant > Workshop Ant Scripts. Click Next.
In the Export Ant Scripts pane, select the projects to generate Ant scripts for and decide whether to create a workspace metadata file.

For non-Workshop for WebLogic project types (i.e. WTP EJB, Connector, Application Client, Java), only the Java Project Build Script is available. This build script provides minimal functionality (just basic build and clean targets) and cannot be used directly within the context of a full EAR build. For these projects, you may find it useful to instead customize the build script created for a utility project.
The Export workspace metadata field controls whether a workspace metadata file is created. This file allows you to run the Ant scripts on a remote machine that does not have access to the workspace, by relativizing absolute paths in the workspace's .metadata directory. For more details see Workspace Metadata File above.
The Destination field controls where the workspace metadata file will be written.

If you click Next, proceed to step 3 below.

On the final screen, The wl.home and workspace.dir will be automatically populated. The purpose of that screen is to define variables to relativize absolute paths in the workspace's .metadata directory. The user can see the remaining absolute paths in the lower box. When a new variable is defined that covers a portion of one of the absolute paths, those absolute paths will be removed from that box. Every variable that’s defined at this point will need to be passed to the ant script at runtime using the -D syntax. Click Finish.

To Export an Ant Build Scripts and a Workspace Metadata File

Choose File > Export > Ant > Workspace Metadata for Workshop Ant Script.

The wizard follows the same steps as To Export Ant Build Scripts and (Optionally) a Workspace Metadata File described above, except that you cannot opt out of the workspace metadata file.

Caveats and Implementation Notes:

Eclipse working sets are not supported.
Projects must be open (Project > Open Project) before exporting an Ant script. You cannot export an Ant script for a closed project.
The Ant script for a project should be regenerated if any changes are made to the project's enabled facets.
The workspace metadata file must be regenerated if changes are made to project metadata (e.g. Java build path) or workspace structure (e.g. new/removed projects, changes in inter-project dependencies).
The machine used to run the ant scripts must have a version of WebLogic Server that matches the version used to generate the ant scripts.

Executing Ant Build Scripts

To Build a Project by Running the Ant Script:

Generate the Ant script for the project.
Configure the execution environment of your shell by executing wl.home/common/bin/commEnv.cmd (or wl.home/common/bin/commEnv.sh for Linux).

Use of the Ant scripts without prior execution of commEnv.cmd (commEnv.sh for Linux) is not currently supported.
Change to the Eclipse project directory.
Execute the desired Ant targets as follows (example illustrates the creation of the project archive):

ant build archive -Dworkspace=workspacepath

where the parameters are:

workspacepath is the full path for the workspace folder (e.g., on Windows you might specify the path as C:/MyWork/Workspaces/MyApp) OR the full path and file name of the workspace metadata file.

If your path names have embedded spaces, you must use quote marks to delimit the path name, e.g.,

ant build -Dworkspace="C:\Documents and Settings\MyWorkspace"

To Build an EAR File Using the Ant Script:

Generate the Ant script for each project in the EAR.
Generate the Ant script for the EAR project.
Configure the execution environment of your shell by executing wl.home/common/bin/commEnv.*
Change to the Eclipse directory for the EAR project.
Execute the desired target in the EAR project's Ant script as follows:

ant build archive -Dworkspace=workspacepath

To Execute Ant Scripts on a Remote Machine:

Generate the workspace metadata file as discussed above.
Generate the necessary project Ant build scripts.
Copy the following files to the remote machine:
- the Ant script(s)
- the workspace metadata file
- everything else in the project and/or ear file, minus the contents of the build directories
Following the project or EAR build instructions above but specify the location of the workspace metadata file as the value of -Dworkspace= argument instead of the workspace directory location.