maven-assembly-plugin v3.3.0 - how to modify generated MANIFEST.MF

[Jean-Pierre Urkens]

Hi all,



I am trying to generate a ‘jar’ assembly that contains a ‘Main-Class’ in
the META-INF/MANIFEST.MF. Now it looks like the assembly plugin is
generating its own (plexus archiver) MANIFEST file with contents:

               Manifest-Version: 1.0

Created-By: Plexus Archiver 4.2.1



My idea was to include via a <fileSet> my own MANIFEST.MF file specifying
the Main-Class and ‘append’ this to the generated MANIFEST using the
‘file-aggregator’ containerDescriptorHandler in my descriptor file:



      <containerDescriptorHandlers>

            <containerDescriptorHandler>

                  <handlerName>file-aggregator</handlerName>

                  <configuration>

                        <filePattern>.*/MANIFEST.MF</filePattern>

                        <outputPath>META-INF/MANIFEST.MF</outputPath>

                  </configuration>

            </containerDescriptorHandler>

      </containerDescriptorHandlers>



This didn’t work so I was wondering whether it found my manifest file. So I
adjusted the above configuration to write to ‘<outputPath>test/
META-INF/MANIFEST.MF</outputPath>’.

My own manifest file resides under ‘db/MANIFEST.MF’ and should be picked up
by:



      <fileSets>

            <fileSet>

                  <directory>${project.build.directory}/classes</directory>

                  <outputDirectory></outputDirectory>

                  <useDefaultExcludes>false</useDefaultExcludes>

                  <includes>

                        <include>db/**</include>

                  </includes>

            </fileSet>

      </fileSets>



Now it does generate an ‘test/META-INF/MANIFEST.MF’ but with following
contents:

               # Aggregated on Thu Feb 18 11:18:39 CET 2021 from:



So it looks that the content of my ‘db/MANIFEST.MF’ isn’t included. What am
I missing? How can I add my own content to the generated manifest file of
this plugin?



Tanks for any hints,



J.P.