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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-06-07T18:12:12+00:00

I have some external configuration (XML files) that are installed in Maven. I need

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I have some external configuration (XML files) that are installed in Maven. I need to have them on my test classpath but they aren’t appearing.

They must stay as XML, I cannot package them inside a Jar – but I am willing to try anything else for this, custom plugin etc.

(Please don’t inform me that Maven is only for Jars – that’s simply not true (and if you provide a reference refuting that I can assure you it’s out-of-date/misinformation).

The dependencies are specified thus:

    <dependency>
        <groupId>some.group</groupId>
        <artifactId>some.artifact</artifactId>
        <version>${project.version}</version>
        <scope>test</scope>
        <type>xml</type>
        <classifier>some.classifier</classifier>
    </dependency>

These XML artifacts have been created by the build-helper plugin (so there’s no 1-2-1 with their project’s POM).

My only current hacky solution is to, check for the M2_HOME property and load the files from there (as they’re defined as dependencies Maven does pull them down) – but I’m not happy with this.

EDIT: The next best hack is probably to use the maven-dependency-plugin to copy these to the output directory (target/classes). If my config is fine for Jars then this smells like a Maven bug.

EDIT 2: @khmarbaise asked for the build-helper-plugin config:

        <plugin>
            <groupId>org.codehaus.mojo</groupId>
            <artifactId>build-helper-maven-plugin</artifactId>
            <executions>
                <execution>
                    <id>attach-artifacts</id>
                    <phase>package</phase>
                    <goals>
                        <goal>attach-artifact</goal>
                    </goals>
                    <configuration>
                        <artifacts>
                            <artifact>
                                <file>target/classes/ddl-seed.xml</file>
                                <type>xml</type>
                                <classifier>ddl-seed</classifier>
                            </artifact>
                            <!-- ... more definitions -->

This generates the correct maven-metadata-local.xml data for all the XML artifacts.

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    Unfortunately I can find no way of forcing maven to add the test dependency specified to the test classpath, other than this stinky hack of copying it to a directory on the test classpath.

    This seems the quickest way (it’s for a test dependency), avoiding any JAR creation.

                <plugin>
            <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
            <artifactId>maven-dependency-plugin</artifactId>
            <executions>
                <execution>
                    <id>unpack</id>
                    <phase>generate-test-resources</phase>
                    <goals>
                        <goal>copy</goal>
                    </goals>
                    <configuration>
                        <artifactItems>
                            <artifactItem>
                                <groupId>com.acme.gid</groupId>
                                <artifactId>com.acme.aid</artifactId>
                                <version>${project.version}</version>
                                <classifier>ddl</classifier>
                                <type>xml</type>
                                <outputDirectory>${project.build.directory}/test-classes</outputDirectory>
                            </artifactItem>
                        </artifactItems>
                    </configuration>
                </execution>
            </executions>
        </plugin>
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