A New Option in Jar Command in JDK 6

JDK 6 adds a new feature to the jar command: e. Other options of the jar command are still the same. This is the partial usage from JDK 6 beta 2:

C:\tools\jdk6\bin > jar
Usage: jar {ctxui}[vfm0Me] [jar-file] [manifest-file] [entry-point] [-C dir] files ...
Options:
 ...
 -e  specify application entry point for stand-alone application
     bundled into an executable jar file
...

For example, I run jar command to package a self-contained application in a jar file:

C:\ws\nb\scrap\build\classes > C:\tools\jdk6\bin\jar cvfe  ..\..\dist\hello-world.jar com.javahowto.test.HelloWorld com
added manifest
adding: com/(in = 0) (out= 0)(stored 0%)
adding: com/javahowto/(in = 0) (out= 0)(stored 0%)
adding: com/javahowto/test/(in = 0) (out= 0)(stored 0%)
adding: com/javahowto/test/HelloWorld.class(in = 572) (out= 348)(deflated 39%)

Then I can distribute hello-world.jar to users, who can run hello-world app like this:

C:\download\hello > java -jar hello-world.jar
Hello world!

Users can run it with any version of java; it doesn't have to be JDK 6. What the extra e option does is simply adding a Main-Class entry in the jar's META-INF\MANIFEST.MF:

Manifest-Version: 1.0
Created-By: 1.6.0-beta2 (Sun Microsystems Inc.)
Main-Class: com.javahowto.test.HelloWorld

This new feature is helpful when packaging simple self-contained apps, and application client modules in J2EE/JavaEE, both of them require a Main-Class entry in MANIFEST.MF. So I don't have to create one beforehand, or have Apache Ant generate one.

Tags: JDK, java, JDK 6, jar, mustang, manifest.mf, meta-inf, hello world