If you want to distribute your Java application as an executable JAR you could use the Maven shade plugin, but it is not the only solution. The solution below shows you how you can use the Java packager to create an executable JAR.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0"
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd">
<modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
<groupId>com.mycompany</groupId>
<artifactId>myjar</artifactId>
<version>1-SNAPSHOT</version>
<packaging>jar</packaging>
<name>MyApplication</name>
<organization>
<name>MyCompany.com</name>
</organization>
<build>
<plugins>
<plugin>
<groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
<artifactId>maven-dependency-plugin</artifactId>
<version>2.10</version>
<executions>
<execution>
<id>package</id>
<phase>package</phase>
<goals>
<goal>unpack-dependencies</goal>
</goals>
<configuration>
<excludeScope>system</excludeScope>
<outputDirectory>${project.build.directory}/classes</outputDirectory>
</configuration>
</execution>
</executions>
</plugin>
<plugin>
<groupId>org.codehaus.mojo</groupId>
<artifactId>exec-maven-plugin</artifactId>
<version>1.5.0</version>
<executions>
<execution>
<id>package</id>
<phase>package</phase>
<goals>
<goal>exec</goal>
</goals>
<configuration>
<executable>${java.home}/../bin/javapackager</executable>
<arguments>
<argument>-createjar</argument>
<argument>-nocss2bin</argument>
<argument>-appclass</argument>
<argument>${mainClass}</argument>
<argument>-srcdir</argument>
<argument>${project.build.directory}/classes</argument>
<argument>-outdir</argument>
<argument>${project.build.directory}</argument>
<argument>-outfile</argument>
<argument>${project.build.finalName}.jar</argument>
</arguments>
</configuration>
</execution>
</executions>
</plugin>
<plugin>
<groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
<artifactId>maven-compiler-plugin</artifactId>
<version>3.1</version>
<configuration>
<source>1.8</source>
<target>1.8</target>
</configuration>
</plugin>
</plugins>
</build>
<dependencies>
<dependency>
<groupId>com.mycompany</groupId>
<artifactId>myapplication</artifactId>
<version>1</version>
<scope>compile</scope>
</dependency>
</dependencies>
<properties>
<project.build.sourceEncoding>UTF-8</project.build.sourceEncoding>
<mainClass>com.mycompany.myapplication.MyApplication</mainClass>
</properties>
</project>
And voila you now have an executable JAR!
Posted December 12, 2016