If you are a java programmer you probably know the Ant build tool. However creating an Ant build script can be very complicated, and hard to maintain. The apache group recently released a new build tool called Maven (which is now in version 2), and it makes the build scripts very easy to create.

Maven is a software project management and comprehension tool. Based on the concept of a project object model (POM), Maven can manage a project’s build, reporting and documentation from a central piece of information.

Indeed getting started with Maven is pretty strait forward, however if you are working in a corporate network and behind a firewall this simple step of configuring maven to use the corporate proxy will save you a lot of time and aggravation.

Edit your maven configuration file settings.xml under maven-2.0.x/conf

Now we need to configure a proxy. In the settings.xml file find the element and add the following child element under it:


<proxy>
   <id>myproxy</id>
   <active>true</active>
   <protocol>http</protocol>
   <host>proxy.yourcompanydomain.com</host>
   <port>80</port>
   <nonproxyhosts>localhost|158.187.*</nonproxyhosts>
</proxy>


Note the <nonProxyHosts> element. This element is needed to bypass proxy for local network access, such as for working with local corporate repository