Question

I have a homework assignment in Java that is tested using the commands:

make
./<program_name> <arguments> 

my make file compiles my java program successfully, but how can the program be run without using the command:

java <program_name> 

I have investigated how to convert a .jar into an .exe but I am convinced that is not the answer I am looking for.

I believe the test is run on a Linux machine. Is there something I can include in the make file to cause the command

./<program_name> 

to run a compiled java class?

Answer 1

Without converting the java program in a native executable file, that will be different for linux, for windows and any other platform (so you will loose Java portability), the only thing you can do is to create a launch script.

On *nix system you can create a bash script and on windows a batch script. Then in this script you have to call java <program_name>.
With the script you are now able to launch your application with a single command.

For example on unix you can create myapp.sh:

#!/bin/bash
java -classpath bin com.test.YourApp $*

and make this script runnable with command

chmod a+x myapp.sh

in this example when you write myapp.sh command you launch your Java class com.test.YourApp using the folder bin as classpath.