*NEWBIE* Ant compile attribute

[Ronnie Phelps]

From what I understand, when ANT is compiling source files, it should skip source files that have been previously compiled and wasn't changed since. But for some reason it doesn't appear to be doing that for me. Is there some attribute I have to set to trigger this behavior?

[Matthew Phillips]

It should be doing it automatically. It checks to see which is older, the .java file or the .class. If the .class is older, then it compiles. If you are saving your .java files without changes it will still treat it as if it has been changed.

[Ronnie Phelps]

Okay I just wanted to make sure. Maybe I'm just not noticing the time difference.

[Tina Coleman]

Verify that the script's not deleting and then making the directory in which you've stored your class files, too. . . Makes for long compile/test cycles, otherwise.

[Ken Krebs]

I believe you need to invoke the <tstamp/> task, probably in your init target if you have one. This will set several properties based on the current system time. The javac task uses these properties to determine whether a source file is out-of-date and needs to be rebuilt.