Renaming resources in Maven

I am trying to find a way to copy a resource file to a new name in the target directory in a Maven build. Pretty much everything I have found while searching suggests workarounds involving multiple sub-directories in /src/main/resources and selecting among them via profiles. However, in my case, this does not solve the problem, namely that the file I want has a "magic" name.

Basically what I want to do is have a /src/main/resources/default.DS_Store file get copied to ${project.build.directory}/.DS_Store. Since the .DS_Store file has special meaning in Mac OSX, it is not desirable to have a file with that name in the source tree, and in version control. However, I do want the data in the file to be in the source tree and version control, and have it renamed to the "magic" name during the build.

I'm starting to think that ant is the only way to do this automatically. Is there any easier way?

Using the antrun-maven-plugin makes it easy, but in case you are looking for a more mavenish way which is supported within eclipse m2e, then you can use the copy-rename-maven-plugin

  <plugin>
    <groupId>com.coderplus.maven.plugins</groupId>
    <artifactId>copy-rename-maven-plugin</artifactId>
    <version>1.0.1</version>
    <executions>
      <execution>
        <id>rename-file</id>
        <phase>compile</phase>
        <goals>
          <goal>rename</goal>
        </goals>
        <configuration>
          <sourceFile>${project.build.outputDirectory}/default.DS_Store</sourceFile>
          <destinationFile>${project.build.outputDirectory}/.DS_Store</destinationFile>
        </configuration>
      </execution>
    </executions>
  </plugin>

And in case you have any feedback/issues with the plugin, you can reach out at https://github.com/coderplus/copy-rename-maven-plugin/

Example usage of the assembly plugin to copy and/or rename a file:

pom file:

<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>test</groupId>
  <artifactId>test</artifactId>
  <version>0.0.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
   <build>
    <plugins>
      <plugin>
        <artifactId>maven-assembly-plugin</artifactId>
        <version>2.2.1</version>
        <configuration>
          <descriptors>
            <descriptor>src/main/descriptors/example.xml</descriptor>
          </descriptors>
        </configuration>
      </plugin>
    </plugins>
  </build>
</project>

Descriptor file:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<assembly>
       <id>example</id>
       <formats>
              <format>dir</format>
       </formats>
       <files>
              <file>
                     <source>src/main/resources/something.properties</source>
                     <outputDirectory>/</outputDirectory>
                     <destName>something.properties</destName>
              </file>
              <file>
                     <source>src/main/resources/something.properties</source>
                     <outputDirectory>/</outputDirectory>
                     <destName>something_en.properties</destName>
              </file>
       </files>
</assembly>

I had the same problem using the copy-rename-maven-plugin solved my problem

    <project>
  ...
  <build>
    <plugins>
      <plugin>
        <groupId>com.coderplus.maven.plugins</groupId>
        <artifactId>copy-rename-maven-plugin</artifactId>
        <version>1.0</version>
        <executions>
          <execution>
            <id>copy-file</id>
            <phase>generate-sources</phase>
            <goals>
              <goal>copy</goal>
            </goals>
            <configuration>
              <sourceFile>src/someDirectory/test.environment.properties</sourceFile>
              <destinationFile>target/someDir/environment.properties</destinationFile>
            </configuration>
          </execution>
        </executions>
      </plugin>
    </plugins>
  </build>
</project>

I see 2 options to solve your problem:

• Use the Maven-Ant-Plugin, and define an Ant rename task that will rename your file only at the packaging phase, in the build directory.
• Use this dedicated Maven plugin (I didn't test it): http://code.google.com/p/maven-file-rename-plugin/

You can avoid the over head of Ant by using the Maven Assembly plugin and the file assembly descriptor.