How to correctly version control (svn:ignore) a Java project (Maven, Spring)?

Question

i was on a 2-day training introducing as to Java EE. We used there Java EE, Spring Framework, Maven, Springsource Tool Suite (Eclipse), Tomcat.

I took the Eclipse workspace we created there and run it on my work PC. I had, if i remember correctly, only to configure Tomcat properly, and it worked on my PC.

Now i want to save the created Eclipse workspace containing 5 "sub"-projects in subversion so that my work colleagues can checkout this to them and run it on their computers.

How to do this correctly? I found somewhere a svn:ignore rule:

.classpath
.project
.settings
target

Using tortoiseSVN i added to the folder with the workspace this ignore rule, but the found out that the underlying folders target were'nt deleted so i deleted them manually and "added to ignore list". But after that the project in spring source tool suite does not see the mevan dependencies (i think so) because the imports are broken. STS underlines org. in the imports and says it can not resolve this.

How do i correctly version control such a project?

Answer 1

In my project we are using Maven and Eclipse (Helios, currently) and the Maven plugins for Eclipse:

Maven Integration for Eclipse Maven Integration for WTP

We only have the pom.xml file and the src/ directory tree in our version control system. We make sure not to add the eclipse files there. Then when a new developer starts in the project they do Import -> Maven -> Existing Maven Projects. The Maven plugins for Eclipse then set up perfect build paths, settings and so on.

This way it is also very easy to re-import your projects into Eclipse as needed.

So, my tip is to leave the Eclipse files out of SVN and make sure you can setup the project correctly automatically simply by importing a Maven project.

Answer 2

If I understand your problem the right way, you need to configure Eclipse in order to be able to launch tomcat from it. The key, here, is not maven anymore, but Eclipse, I think. As you've made modifications in your workspace that can't be put in your maven configuration file (the pom.xml), you become "Eclipse dependant".

The key here is that, as you're Eclipse dependant, you need the Eclipse configuration files to work. Consequently, I'm afraid you need to add back .classpath, .project, .settings to your versioning tool... It's not generic, because you force people who work on your project to use Eclipse. But if everybody in your team do so, it shouldn't be a problem.

As I don't use Eclipse anymore, I don't know if versioning theses files can lead to problems. However, I hope this answer will help you to configure your project back...

EDIT : to be more accurate... and maybe give a better answer.

When using a version control system, the main goal is often (always ?) to give all the keys to use the sources, and develop from them. Consequently, you need to put in your VCS your sources, and all the configurations needed to use them efficiently.

In your specific case, the key is that you've become Eclipse dependant through its Springsource Tool Suite plugin. Consequently, it becomes essential to add the configuration files for this tool, because they can't work without them, and if they can't work, you can't work.