Version 1.7.0Beta2 of Apache Ant
Release Notes: This version contains some bugfixes and improvements compared to 1.7.0Beta1, particularly concerning the script task. Ant 1.7 introduces a resource framework. Some of the core ant tasks such as <:copy/>: are now able to process not only file system resources but also zip entries, tar entries, and paths. Resource collections group resources, and can be further combined with operators such as union and intersection. This can be extended by custom resources and custom tasks using resources. Ant 1.7 starts outsourcing of optional tasks to Antlibs, such as .NET, svn, and antunit.
Other releases
Release Notes: Performance improvements in directory scanning. The XSLT task honors the classpath again (bugrep 49271). The distinction between core tasks and optional tasks is abolished. Numerous bugfixes and improvements as documented in Bugzilla and in WHATSNEW.
Release Notes: New task augmenting allows users to add attributes or nested elements to previously defined references. Numerous bugfixes and improvements were made, as documented in Bugzilla and in the WHATSNEW file.
Release Notes: Lexically scoped local properties were added. <import> can now import from any file- or URL-providing resource. Various improvements to the directory scanning code improved scanning performance. There were numerous other bugfixes and improvements.
Release Notes: A new top level element, extension-point, allows build files to be extended with custom targets more easily. The "if" and "unless" attributes will be evaluated according to the values of the properties entered if these properties evaluate to true, false, on, or off. Ant now requires Java 1.4 or later. A new task, include, provides an alternative to <import> that should be preferred when you don't want to override any targets. Numerous bugfixes and improvements were made.
Release Notes: The main release focus is on fixing bugs and improving performance. Java 6 support has been enhanced, and JavaFX is supported by the script task.
