Running a Java class from maven

To run a java class from maven we can use org.codehaus.mojo:exec-maven-plugin.  This offers two goals: exec & java.  The exec goal runs the program in a seperate process.  Below is the usage of these goals:

args is treated as single string
arguments is treated as an array of strings

mvn exec:java -Dexec.mainClass=org.junit.runner.JUnitCore -Dexec.args="MyTest"
mvn exec:java -Dexec.mainClass=org.junit.runner.JUnitCore -Dexec.arguments="MyTest"

mvn exec:exec -Dexec.executable=java -Dexec.args="-cp %classpath org.junit.runner.JUnitCore MyTest"

I was trying to run a JUnit test case as a class instead of using with surefire plugin as a unit test.  Also note the classpath setting for exec goal, % is only at the beginning.  This would be replaced by the project build classpath.

Maven books from Sonatype

Maven by Example - (html link) (pdf link)
Maven complete reference (html link) (pdf link)
Maven cookbook (html link) (pdf link)