Why Javascript Archives ?

Storing javascripts in a maven repo has many options :

1. Store as ".js", that is fine for one-file-libraries like prototype, but not adequate for modulars one like scriptaculous, yahooUI, dojo...

2. Store as a jar of .js scripts. To avoid conflict with classpath jars, use a custom dependency type '''javascript'''.

3. Store as a war. This has the advantage to integrate with the war plugin overlay without any more work required, and to allow not only javascripts but also static ressources like images and css. This has the side effect that the js dependencies is tied to web application development and cannot be used for pure javascript devs. This also has the side effect that the war plugin requires a WEB-INF/web.xml to exist, and the js files to be placed into a standardized folder, like "scripts", that is not configurable.

The javascript plugin makes the choice of option 2, providing the necessary support for a new archive format (dependency downloading, pack and unpack...).

How to use then ?

Simply declare dependencies of type "javascript" as you do with java dependencies. The javascript plugin MUST be declared as an extension in your POM.xml to register this type and allow maven to download them from repositories.

<project>
  ...
  <build>
    <plugins>
      <plugin>
        <groupId>org.codehaus.mojo</groupId>
        <artifactId>maven-javascript-plugin</artifactId>
        <extensions>true</extensions>
      </plugin>
    </plugins>
  </build>
</project>

Don't forget the extensions elements !