Running ant build gives "package org.junit does not exist"

Question

When I use a Java IDE to build projects (e.g. NetBeans) that have JUnit tests, they compile fine, but when I try to use ant outside of the IDE to run the build script, I get the error "package org.junit does not exist".

Answer 1

You should add your junit.jar into the classpath definition in your ant file.

There are many way to do it, one example is:

<junit printsummary="yes" haltonfailure="yes">
    <classpath>
        <path refid="your.classpath.refid" />
        <fileset dir="${junit.dir}">
            <include name="**/junit.jar" />
        </fileset>
    </classpath>
    ...
</junit>

See Ant Manual for details on setting up your classpath.

Answer 2

The problem was that in the IDE, it set the classpath correctly to include the .jar for JUnit. Running ant outside the IDE, the classpath was different, thus the error. The fix was to put the JUnit .jar in the folder "C:\Program Files\Java\jre6\lib\ext" so it would always be found outside of any IDE.

Answer 3

Late answer here.

Copy the junit.jar file to the ${ANT_HOME}/lib folder.