How to specify packaging of desired EAR modules on command-line

Question

I've got a typical multi-module JavaEE setup. A root project (common parent) of POM type, which contains all JavaEE projects as modules. I also have an EAR type project which defines the packaging of modules within an EAR archive. By running "mvn package" via root project - all modules get built, packaged and as a last step an EAR is built and packaged with the corresponding modules inside (JAR, WAR, etc.), the "application.xml" file is generated automatically and included in the EAR.

My question is whether there are any advanced options using which I could specify the list of modules I want for inclusion in the EAR? Sort of overriding what is defined in the "modules" element of the maven-ear-plugin's configuration. The motivation behind it is that for our project we generate EAR containing different sets of modules each time.

I know that it's achievable using maven profiles, variables and module's "exclude" element, however, such solution would require defining a profile for every possible set of modules subject to inclusion into the EAR. There should be some elegant solution for it.

PS. Also, I can't consider text replacement via "sed" or similar tools/plugins.

Answer 1

In the end I went with the "profile" solution. Here is how I have implemented it. Initially, the "exclude" property for each module is set to "true":

<properties>
     ...
     <module_name.exclude>true</module_name.exclude>
     ...
</properties>

All modules within EAR project are defined in this way:

....
<ejbModule>
    <groupId>xx.xxx.xxx</groupId>
    <artifactId>module_name</artifactId>
    <bundleDir>/</bundleDir>
    <bundleFileName>module_name-ejb.jar</bundleFileName>
    <excluded>${module_name.exclude}</excluded>
</ejbModule>
....

At the same time I have defined profiles like this:

<profile>
  <id>module_name</id>
  <properties>
      <module_name.exclude>false</module_name.exclude>
  </properties>
</profile>

After all this, whenever I execute "mvn -P module_name package" a corresponding profile is activated, which sets the "exclude" property to "false" and as a result the module gets deployed. Since maven supports combining of profiles, it is also possible to execute "mvn -P module_name1,module_name2,... package" in which case only the specified modules will get deployed.

I have also defined a "full" profile which is activated by default via <activeByDefault>true</activeByDefault> and which sets exclude properties for all modules to "false" building an EAR with all modules. Thus by running "mvn package" and not specifying any profile - I get EAR with all modules.

PS. I only couldn't get rid of the "building" of unnecessary dependencies and the inclusion of (transitive) dependency "jars" under "lib" directory of the EAR. Although it doesn't harm, it is a redundancy.

Answer 2

The first things is to create separate modules for your different modules lists to get this simply via mvn clean package get everything in one step. The profiles might be an option but it's not the best.

To do replacements in different files you could use filtering.