How to get Java MANIFEST.MF to include Maven Version Number

Question

I have the following in my project's pom.xml which I think should display the version of Maven being used in the resulting WAR file:

<build>
...
    <plugins>
        ...
        <plugin>
            <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
            <artifactId>maven-war-plugin</artifactId>
            <version>2.1.1</version>
            <configuration>
                <archive>
                    <manifest>
                        <addClasspath>false</addClasspath>
                    </manifest>
                    <manifestEntries>
                        <Build-Time>${maven.build.timestamp}</Build-Time>
                        <Build-Host>${agent.name}</Build-Host>
                        <Build-User>${user.name}</Build-User>
                        <Build-Maven>Maven ${maven.version}</Build-Maven>
                        <Build-Java>${java.version}</Build-Java>
                        <Build-OS>${os.name}</Build-OS>
                        <Build-Label>${project.version}</Build-Label>
                        <Build-Path>${basedir}</Build-Path>
                    </manifestEntries>
                </archive>
            </configuration>
        </plugin>
        ...
    </plugins>
...
</build>

The MANIFEST.MF that is created looks correct see below apart from the Build-Maven line in which the ${maven.version} is not substituted with the actual version number 3.0.4 in this case.

Manifest-Version: 1.0
Archiver-Version: Plexus Archiver
Created-By: Apache Maven
Built-By: stocjon
Build-Jdk: 1.6.0_35
Build-Host: 
Build-Java: 1.6.0_35
Build-Label: 1.0.0-SNAPSHOT
Build-Maven: Maven ${maven.version}
Build-OS: Windows XP
Build-Path: C:\Development\project_name
Build-Time: 15:38:50 21-Sep-2012
Build-User: user_name

Any ideas why Maven version is not being populated in the MANIFEST.MF ?

Help would be much appreciated.

Thanks Jon

Answer 1

You need to add this plugin:

<plugin>
<groupId>org.codehaus.mojo</groupId>
<artifactId>build-helper-maven-plugin</artifactId>
<version>1.5</version>
  <executions>
    <execution>
      <phase>validate</phase>
      <goals>
        <goal>maven-version</goal>
      </goals>
    </execution>
  </executions>
</plugin>

Check here for details.

Answer 2

We no more need the build-helper-maven-plugin since the feature (MSHARED-38) was added to the component maven-archiver : 2.5 in Feb. 2012 (release notes).

And this component is used by the Maven plugins like maven-jar-plugin, maven-war-plugin, maven-ear-plugin, etc.

The versions of these plugins using this feature are :

• maven-jar-plugin : 2.4 (MJAR-148), released in Feb. 2012
• maven-war-plugin : 2.2 (MWAR-273), released in Feb. 2012
• maven-ear-plugin : 2.8 (MEAR-145), released in Sept. 2012
• maven-assembly-plugin : 2.4 (MASSEMBLY-634), released in Nov. 2012
• maven-ejb-plugin : 2.4 (MEJB-56), EDIT : released on 24/Aug/14
• etc.

So now we'll have this entry by default in the archive's manifest.mf :

Created-By: Apache Maven ${maven.version}