We have a maven plugin that does pear packaging; we use it ourselves in some builds.
It's maven coordinates are: GroupId: org.apache.uima ArtifactId: PearPackagingMavenPlugin Maven, when running a specific plugin, specifies that plugin using the syntax: mvn groupId:artifactId:version:goal So to run the pear packager, people have to type: mvn org.apache.uima:PearPackagingMavenPlugin:2.3.1:package The page http://maven.apache.org/guides/plugin/guide-java-plugin-development.html describes several shortenings of this, based on conventions. 1) to run the "latest" version, leave off the version: mvn org.apache.uima:PearPackagingMavenPlugin:package 2) If the plugin artifactId follows the naming convention of maven-$name-plugin or $name-maven-plugin, then you can type mvn groupId:$name:version:goal. An email thread (see http://markmail.org/message/h3dit6ml4nrciysv ) says that the first of these forms is reserved for the artifacts in the groupId of org.apache.maven.plugins. The 2nd was originally reserved (I think?) for the groupId of org.codehaus.mojo, but also can be used for other groupIds. If we renamed our plugin to follow this convention, to be the artifactId uimapear-maven-plugin, then to run the latest version of this from the mvn command line, you would type: mvn org.apache.uima:uimapear:package If this convention is followed, then with an additional entry in a local .m2/settings.xml file that adds the org.apache.uima "groupId" to the list of groupIds for the maven plugin lookup mechanism to use, you can reduce this further to: mvn uimapear:package I think it is probably a good idea to change the artifactId to follow the $name-maven-plugin convention. Other opinions? If we do change the name, is $name = uimapear a good candidate? (This would allow future expansion of the functionality, although currently it only supports a"package" goal). The bad side effect is that it would affect existing users (if they currently have scripts using the old name), when/if they upgraded. I'm not sure the best way to mitigate this... -Marshall
