Protégé Build Instructions


This documentation is targeted toward users who would like to compile the Protégé source code using an Ant build file. You can retrieve our source code in one of two ways: System Requirements

Before building Protégé, you must have the following software installed on your system:

Source Package Structure

Pertinent files in Protégé's source package:

build.xml Ant build file
local.properties.template Properties file contaning variables used by the Ant build file
readme.html Build instructions
/bin/Parser.jj Grammar file used by JavaCC during the compile process
/lib Directory containing third party libraries needed to compile the Protégé source code
/src Directory containing the Protégé source code


Initiating a Build

Steps for initiating a build:
  1. From the command line, change into the installation directory (where the Protégé source code was unzipped).
  2. Rename local.properties.template to local.properties. We added the ".template" extension so that each time the source code is downloaded, the local.properties file is not overwritten which causes user defined settings to be lost.
  3. Open local.properties and set the javacc.home variable to the location of your JavaCC installation directory.
  4. To start the build process, type "ant all".
When the build is finished, there are several resulting items:

/classes Directory containing compiled Protégé source files
/dist Directory containing the newly generated Protégé JAR file as well as source and binary distributions of Protégé packaged in ZIP format
/docs/apidocs Directory containing the newly generated Protégé API documentation (javadoc)

It's also possible to run various parts of the build separately. For a list of available targets, type "ant" on the command line.