Working with Ivy

Artifactory fully supports using Ivy both as a source for artifacts needed for a build and as a target to deploy artifacts generated in the build process.

For Ivy to work with Artifactory, the following files must be present and configured:

1. The Ivy settings file: ivysettings.xml is used to configure resolution and deployment of artifacts using repositories in Artifactory.
2. The Ivy modules file: ivy.xml is where the project's modules and dependencies are declared.
3. The Ant build file: build.xml is used to execute the ANT tasks that will, in turn, use Ivy for resolution and deployment of artifacts.

Ivy Settings - ivysettings.xml

The ivysettings.xml file holds a chain of Ivy resolvers for both regular artifacts and Ivy module files. These are used to resolve and publish (i.e. deploy) artifacts.

There are a two ways to configure resolvers in ivysettings.xml to set up Ivy to work with Artifactory:

1. Automatically, using the Artifactory Ivy Settings Generator
2. Manually defining IBiblio and URL resolvers.

Automatic Settings with Artifactory's Ivy Settings Generator

To begin quickly, you can define credentials and resolver settings using Artifactory's Ivy Settings Generator. This generates a URL resolver suitable for resolution.

In the Artifact Repository Browser of the Artifacts module, select Set Me Up. In the Set Me Up dialog, set Ivy in the Tool field and click "Generate Ivy Settings". You can now specify the repositories you want to configure for Ivy.

Since the Libs Repository field only includes virtual or remote repositories, none of these will be suitable for deployment, and you need to modify the deployment URL to point to a local repository.

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Select an Ivy Repository Layout

Be sure to select layout that is compatible with Ivy such as ivy-default or a custom layout that you have defined.

Provision Dynamic Settings for Users

Deploy and provision a dynamic settings template for your users.

After being downloaded, settings are generated according to your own logic, and can automatically include user authentication information.

For details, see Provision Build Tool Settings under Filtered Resources.

Define a Manual Resolver

This section reviews the various resolvers that can be defined and include:

1. The Ibiblio Resolver
2. The URL Resolver
3. The Chain Resolver

The IBiblio Resolver and Ivy

This resolver is only used to resolve dependencies. By default, it assumes artifacts in your repository are laid-out in the popular and standard Maven 2 format (which may not always be the case).

The IBiblio resolver can resolve artifacts from remote Maven 2 HTTP repositories, and if you use version ranges it relies on maven-metadata.xml files in the remote repository to gather information on the available versions.

To use the IBiblio resolver, add the following to your ivysettings.xml file:

<resolvers>
    <ibiblio name="artifactory" m2compatible="true" root="http://localhost:8080/artifactory/libs-releases"/>
</resolvers>

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Note

The URL specified in the root property must point to an Artifactory repository. In the above example, it is the pre-configured libs-releases virtual repository.

Them2compatibleproperty configures the resolver with an artifact pattern that follows the standard Maven 2 layout.

The URL Resolver and Ivy

The URL resolver can be used to resolve dependencies and/or for deployment of both regular artifacts and Ivy module files.

To publish or resolve artifacts to or from Artifactory, you need to configure a URL resolver with the pattern that matches your target repository layout for both Ivy and artifact files.

For example:

{/* Authentication required for publishing (deployment). 'Artifactory Realm' is the realm used by Artifactory so don't change it. */}
<credentials host="localhost" realm="Artifactory Realm" username="admin" passwd="password"/>
<resolvers>
    <url name="artifactory-publish">
        {/* You can use  m2compatible="true" instead of specifying your own pattern */}
        <artifact pattern=
          "http://localhost:8080/artifactory/ivy-local/[organization]/[module]/[revision]/[artifact]-[revision].[ext]"/>
        <ivy pattern="http://localhost:8080/artifactory/ivy-local/[organization]/[module]/[revision]/ivy-[revision].xml" />
    </url>
</resolvers>

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Note

The URL resolver uses HTML href analysis to learn about the available versions of a remote artifact. This is less reliable than using an IBiblio resolver, however it works well with remote Artifactory servers.

The Chain Resolver and Ivy

You can combine resolver definitions under a chain resolver in Ivy which uses a set of sub resolvers to resolve dependencies and for publishing.

For details please refer to the Ivy documentation for Chain Resolver.

Ivy Modules - ivy.xml

ivy.xml file contains a list of dependency declarations that must be resolved for the build.

In the Artifact Repository Browser of the Artifacts module, you can obtain dependency declaration snippets by selecting either an Ivy module, or a POM artifact, and copying the Ivy Dependency Declaration section into your ivy.xml file.

Ant Build - build.xml

To work with Ivy to resolve dependencies, you need to use < ivy:configure/> in your build.xml file. This will load the Ivy settings from ivysettings.xml.

Artifacts are resolved using < ivy:retrieve/>.

For details please refer to the Ivy documentation for Ant Tasks.

Publish Ivy to Artifactory

You can use the < ivy:publish> command to configure Ivy to deploy your artifacts into Artifactory using the specified resolver.

For example:

<ivy:publish resolver="artifactory-publish" overwrite="true">
   {/* Use overwrite="true" if you wish to overwrite existing artifacts
   and publishivy="false" if you only want to publish artifacts not module descriptors */}
   <artifacts/>
</ivy:publish>

Use a Dedicated Settings File for Deployment with Ivy

If you have specified deployment settings with the required credentials in a dedicated settings file, you can refer to them by assigning a unique ID.

For example, the following code snippet assigns the deployment settings with the id ivy.publish.settings:

<ivy:settings id="ivy.pub.settings" file="publish_to_artifactory_settings.xml"/>

Then, the publishing task points to these settings using the following attribute in the publish element:

settingsRef="ivy.pub.settings"

For details please refer to the Ivy documentation for Ant Tasks.