Codedrop™ Weblog

I keep coming across instances of ant build files where developers have hard coded a usage target that outputs target actions.  This is not required and should be avoided as it is often not maintained.  Instead, properly maintain the description attribute of each target and use a default target as below:  

<project name="foo" basedir="." default="usage">

...

<target name="usage">
        <java classname="org.apache.tools.ant.Main">
            <arg value="-projecthelp"/>
            <classpath>
                <pathelement location="${lib.dir}/ant/ant.jar"/>
                <pathelement location="${lib.dir}/ant/ant-launcher.jar"/>
                <pathelement location="${lib.dir}/ant/xerces_2.8.0.jar"/>
            </classpath>
        </java>
    </target>

...

</project>