Stampysoft Ant Tasks - version 1.1.0

Of these four Ant tasks, three are intended to simplify building J2ME code. Two (Preverify and UpdateJAD) are general purpose J2ME tasks. Preverify requires that the J2ME Wireless Toolkit be installed. The third (MakePRC) is for use with Sun's MIDP for PalmOS tools. If you are using either of those two tasks, you will need to download the tools from Sun, install them, and let Ant know where to find them as shown in the examples.

The last (JARSourceCopier) is intended to help gather just the source files that are relevant to a program or library release. It will track down and copy just the source files that correspond to class files in a JAR file. It's useful because it lets you easily select just the subset of source files that are needed for a particular distribution.

For all four tasks, you'll need to put StampysoftAntTasks.jar in your ant/lib directory and use a <taskdef/> element to let Ant know about the task. The examples below show how to do that.

If you encounter problems or have suggestions or would like to contribute your changes, please email me at josh@jeckels.com.

Preverify - Preverify files using J2ME Wireless Toolkit
UpdateJAD - Update the JAR file size in a JAD file
MakePRC - Convert class files into a PRC for use on PalmOS with MIDP4Palm support
JARSourceCopier - Copy .java files that correspond to .class files in a specified JAR file

Preverify

Description

Preverifies a set of class files to prepare them to run on a J2ME device on the KVM. Recursively searches unverified directory for class files and verfies them all. This task currently works with the J2ME Wireless toolkit for Windows and Linux.

Parameters

Attribute Description Required
unverified Directory which is the root of the unverified package hierarchy. Yes
verified Directory which is the root of the verified package hierarchy. Yes

Example

  <taskdef name="preverify" classname="com.stampysoft.ant.j2me.PreverifyTask" />
  <property name="j2mewtk.home" value="c:/j2mewtk" />

  <preverify unverified="./unverified" verified="./verified" />

Preverifies all the class files in ./unverified and puts the new class files in ./verified.


UpdateJAD

Description

Updates the MIDlet-Jar-Size entry in a JAD file with the new JAR file size.

Parameters

Attribute Description Required
jad

Location of the JAD file
Must contain a MIDlet-Jar-URL entry that points to the local file system

Yes
relativePath

If the MIDlet-Jar-URL entry in the JAD starts with file://, whether or not to interpret the path as relative to the location of the JAD
(true/false, defaults to false)

No

Example

  <taskdef name="updatejad" classname="com.stampysoft.ant.j2me.UpdateJARSizeTask" />

  <updatejad jad="sample.jad" />

Examines the JAD file sample.jad, checks the size of the JAR file specified by the MIDlet-Jar-URL property, and updates the MIDlet-Jar-Size property in the JAD if it is out of date.

If the MIDlet-JAR-URL property starts with "file://" the path is treated as an absolute path. Otherwise, the path should be relative to the location of the JAR file.


MakePRC

Description

Turns a JAR (possibly accompanied by a JAD) into a PRC that can be transfered to a Palm handheld and executed. Mostly a thin wrapper around the MIDP4Palm utility, MakeMIDPApp.jar. Note that newer versions of MIDP4Palm have changed the location of this utility to ./Converter/Converter.jar. As of version 1.0.1, this task looks in both places.

This task currently supports both the full 1.0 release and the 1.0 Early Access release, although support for 1.0EA may be removed from future releases. It will automatically determine which is installed on your system and act accordingly. The updated version requires that the JAR file contain MIDP-related manifest information. There are many places to find information on what this manifest must include, but I've had success based on this JBuilder page.

Please note that the converter utility in the 1.0 release does not currently work with manifest files generated by the Ant <jar> task. Instead, use something like the following to first build the JAR file and then add the manifest file in a separate step:

<jar jarfile="password.jar" basedir="../verified" includes="**/*.class" />
<exec executable="jar">
    <arg line="ufm" />
    <arg line="password.jar" />
    <arg line="manifest-additions.mf" />
</exec>

Please note that the author has not fully tested all possible usage. Most descriptions are taken from the help output from MakeMIDPApp.jar. Some options are not supported, like -resource and -empty.

Parameters

Attribute Description Required
jar JAR file containing the classes for the MIDlet. Yes
mainclass Fully qualified classname of the MIDlet that serves as the entry point to the application. Removed in MIDP4Palm 1.0. One of the two
jad JAD describing the MIDlet suite
verbose Verbose output (true/false) No
prc Filename for resulting PRC, defaults to same filename as the jar attribute No
version Version tag for the MIDlet No
name Short name of application, seen in the launcher No
longName Long name for the application, seen in beaming, etc No
creator Creator ID for the application (Palm Creator ID) No
type File type for the application, defaults to appl No
classpath Where to search for application classes, should not be needed if everything is already in the JAR No
bootclasspath Where to search for system classes No
icon File containing icon for application
Must be in bmp, pbm, or bin (Palm Resource) format
No
smallicon Unknown - may be same as icon No
beam Whether or not the MIDlet supports beaming over IR (true/false). Removed in MIDP4Palm 1.0. No
networking Whether or not the application can perform networking (true/false, defaults to "false"). Removed in MIDP4Palm 1.0. No
listicon File containing the "list" icon for application. Removed in MIDP4Palm 1.0. No

Examples

  <taskdef name="makePRC" classname="com.stampysoft.ant.j2me.JARToPRCTask" />
  <property name="midp4palm.home" value="c:/midp4palm" />

  <makePRC jar="sample.jar" jad="sample.jad" name="Sample MIDlet suite" />

Makes sample.prc using the information in sample.jad and the classes from sample.jar, using the entry point specified in the JAD file.

  <taskdef name="makePRC" classname="com.stampysoft.ant.j2me.JARToPRCTask" />
  <property name="midp4palm.home" value="c:/midp4palm" />

  <makePRC jar="sample.jar" mainclass="sample.MainClass" networking="true" />

Makes sample.prc, enabling networking support, using the classes from sample.jar, using sample.MainClass as the application entry point.


JARSourceCopier

Description

Copies a set of .java files that correspond to .class files in a JAR file.

Parameters

Attribute Description Required
jar JAR file which contains the .class files whose source should be copied. Yes
src Directory which is the root of the source code package hierarchy. Yes
dest Directory which is the root of the package hierarchy into which the .java files should be copied. Yes

Example

  <taskdef name="JARSourceCopier" classname="com.stampysoft.ant.misc.JARSourceCopierTask" />

  <JARSourceCopier jar="./distribution.jar" src="./src" dest="./srcDistribution" />

Examines ./distribution.jar, looks for corresponding .java files in ./src, and copies the ones it finds into ./srcDistribution.


Copyright © 2001 Josh Eckels. All rights reserved.