I'm trying to figure out the best way to explain what I'm looking for here, so please bare with me.
I am writing code that uses an external API from a third party, so I am including several external jars in my build. There are many versions and builds of these jars i need to support. I am working with
java 1.5
For example my code needs to work with
Version 5.2 builds 12 and 207
as well as
Version 6.3 builds 022 and 200
Right now I have two Eclipse projects that are specifically coded against the appropriate version, and I have
ant files that compile against the appropriate builds of the external jars.
With other builds and versions coming down the road, and things already confusing I want to simplify things, so I have one ANT file to run them all. I"m assuming this won't be too hard, and can be looked up elsewhere.
My issue is that when I run the code from the created jar, I'm printing out information:
External Product: V 5.2 build 12 Product version 1.1.7
Build date: ddMMyyyy
But these are strings that I am manually changing in my code, before I run the appropriate Ant file. Is there a way I can have this information put into the created manifest file, and then have Java read from the Manifest file, so I don't have to even think about it? What I would love to do is to put "V1.1.7" into my master Ant file, and it distributes that information to the other Ant files which then create the proper manifests, which THEN the java reads and spits out the right information to the user.
I will say that I am pretty much am not very experienced with Ant. I created my Ant build about 3 months ago as my first experience with Ant, and asides from copying the file I already created I haven't touched it since.
If anybody has any ideas, or if I'm not being clear in what I'm looking for let me know.