Ant: adding additional JARs to classpath

I was working in a custom ATG module in which I required to extend a core ATG class. When I ran the build ant command I got compile errors because of "cannot find symbol", in other words, my dear reference class was not being recognized. It was missing! In my Eclipse project I got no errors because I had the right library included in the project's classpath.

I started looking on how to add additional JAR files to the classpath, but after digging a little bit more in the compile target referenced in the build.xml:

<target name="build" depends="echo-build-message,clean,compile,jar-classes,jar-configs,copy-to-install" />

I saw how could I add additional classpath entries using the reference id "classpath.additions". In the included common.xml file we had this:

 
<target name="compile">
     <mkdir dir="${java.output.dir}"/>
        <mkdir dir="${java.src.dir}"/>
        <copy todir="${java.output.dir}">
            <fileset dir="${java.src.dir}">
                <include name="**/*.properties" />
                <include name="**/*.xml" />
            </fileset>
        </copy>
     <if>
      <isreference refid="classpath.additions" />
      <then>
       <path id="fullClasspath">
        <path refid="classpath" />
        <path refid="classpath.additions" />
       </path>
      </then>
      <else>
       <path id="fullClasspath">
        <path refid="classpath" />
       </path>
       </else>
     </if>
        
     <echo message="java.src.dir: ${java.src.dir}, java.output.dir: ${java.output.dir}" />
     <javac srcdir="${java.src.dir}" destdir="${java.output.dir}" classpathref="fullClasspath" debug="on" includeAntRuntime="false" />
</target>

So I just added this in the build.xml:

<path id="classpath.additions"> 
  <fileset dir="${dynamo.home}/../REST/lib"><include name="**/*.jar" /></fileset>  
</path> 

This seems like an elegant generic way for configuring classpaths in a multi module environment like ATG.

ATG: Nucleus tips

Get current request URI

import atg.servlet.ServletUtil;
//...
ServletUtil.getCurrentRequest().getRequestURI();

Define a collection of components

Java:

    
protected Component [] componentes;

public void setComponents(Component [] components) {
   this.components = components;
}
    
public Component [] getComponents() {
   return components;
}

Properties:

components=\
 /path/to/some/Component,\
        /path/to/another/Component