Question

I have started reading about Maven and I don’t understand how I am able to know which artifact I should pick when for example making a quick search for javaee6. Are there any difference between the two artifacts below? After what I have read to this point the groupId is the “unique” name for a company/group etc and artifactId is the name of the actual project. So are these two just two projects for javaee6?

I could need some explanation on how it is ment to be read, and know which to choose when there are many options.

Group: org.jboss.javaee
Artifact: jboss-javaee
Version: 5.2.0.Beta1
Extension: jar

and

Group: javax.javaee
Artifact: javaee
Version: 6.0-alpha-1
Extension: jar

Answer 1

They are two different jars. One is provided by jboss and the other one provided by Sun/Oracle.

jboss-javaee-5.2.0.Beta1.jar is provided by jboss as noted here:-

Group: org.jboss.javaee

Whereas, javaee-6.0-alpha-1 is provided by Sun/Oracle as noted:-

Group: javax.javaee (javax is the standard package prefix for java extension classes)

Java EE jars are not supposed to be packaged with the application. They are provided by the conatiners (tomcat, jboss, weblogic, etc). Usually you will use the concept of scope here to say it’s a provided level jar so that maven does not package the jars with your application.

In maven terminology groupId, artifactId, version represent a trinity. These 3 co-ordinates makes a maven jar locatable in a maven artifactory (repository of jars). You can read more about how to interpret them here.

Hope this helps!