<project name="subant" default="subant1"> <property name="build.dir" value="subant.build"/> <target name="subant1"> <subant target=""> <property name="build.dir" value="subant1.build"/> <property name="not.overloaded" value="not.overloaded"/> <fileset dir="." includes="*/build.xml"/> </subant> </target> </project>
this snippet build file will run ant in each subdirectory of the project directory, where a file called build.xml can be found. The property build.dir will have the value subant1.build in the ant projects called by subant.
<subant target=""> <propertyset> <propertyref prefix="toplevel"/> <mapper type="glob" from="foo*" to="bar*"/> </propertyset> <fileset dir="." includes="*/build.xml"/> </subant>
this snippet build file will run ant in each subdirectory of the project directory, where a file called build.xml can be found. All properties whose name starts with "foo" are passed, their names are changed to start with "bar" instead
<subant target="compile" genericantfile="/opt/project/build1.xml"> <dirset dir="." includes="projects*"/> </subant>
assuming the subdirs of the project dir are called projects1, projects2, projects3 this snippet will execute the compile target of /opt/project/build1.xml, setting the basedir to projects1, projects2, projects3
Now a little more complex - but useful - scenario. Assume that we have a directory structure like this:
root | common.xml | build.xml | +-- modules +-- modA | +-- src +-- modB +-- src common.xml:
<project> <property name="src.dir" value="src"/> <property name="build.dir" value="build"/> <property name="classes.dir" value="${build.dir}/classes"/> <target name="compile"> <mkdir dir="${classes.dir}"/> <javac srcdir="${src.dir}" destdir="${classes.dir}"/> </target> <!-- more targets --> </project> build.xml:
<project> <macrodef name="iterate"> <attribute name="target"/> <sequential> <subant target="@{target}"> <fileset dir="modules" includes="*/build.xml"/> </subant> </sequential> </macrodef> <target name="compile"> <iterate target="compile"/> </target> <!-- more targets --> </project> modules/modA/build.xml:
<project name="modA"> <import file="../../common.xml"/> </project>
This results in very small buildfiles in the modules, maintainable buildfile (common.xml) and a clear project structure. Additionally the root buildfile is capable to run the whole build over all modules.
<subant failonerror="false"> <fileset dir="." includes="**/build.xml" excludes="build.xml"/> <target name="clean"/> <target name="build"/> </subant>
Does a "clean build" for each subproject.
Hint: because buildfiles are plain xml, you could generate the masterbuildfile from the common buildfile by using a XSLT transformation:
<xslt in="common.xml" out="master.xml" style="${ant.home}/etc/common2master.xsl" />