JavaFX Maven Plugin -

Building an Executable JAR Distribution Bundle

To build a JavaFX-aware, executable JAR, with JavaFX pre-loader support (to load JavaFX onto the classpath when running), then use the specific JavaFX Maven Plugin goal for this:

mvn clean jfx:jar

The resulting JAR will be built into 'target/jfx/app'.

Any third-party libraries (i.e. runtime dependencies from your project's POM) will be copied into 'target/jfx/app/lib'. The manifest of the executable JAR produced for your project will reference these libraries using the relative lib directory. When you distribute your application, you need to distribute the JAR and the lib directory!

Note: previous versions of the JavaFX Maven Plugin assembled the entire application into one 'uber-jar' that contained all the third party libraries in one big JAR. This caused a lot of problems with name clashes, etc, and was generally a bad idea.

Running the app

The JavaFX Maven Plugin also provides a convenience method for running your JavaFX app from the command line, using Maven. Typically you will use your IDE to launch your app, but this command can come in handy at times:

mvn jfx:run

This command is just a convenience wrapper around the standard Maven 'exec' command and just saves you the hassle of re-specifying the main class, which the JavaFX Maven Plugin already knows about. It does not do any particular JavaFX magic and is no different to running the main() method of your app from within your favourite IDE.