Simple Java development setup

A simple setup for small Java development projects could be:

• Create the source directory ($PROJ_HOME) which will contain all .java files.
• Create the directory $PROJ_HOME/proj_name which will contain all the .class files.
• Add $PROJ_HOME to the CLASSPATH.
• During development, keep a terminal open with working directory $PROJ_HOME, and run "javac *.java -d ." to compile all source files and store the class files in proj_name.
• Run a class from anywhere using java proj_name.ClassName [args].

In addition:

• Store metadata files etc. required by the code in $PROJ_HOME/meta. If they need to be passed by command line arguments, you can pass $PROJ_HOME/meta/datafile.txt as an argument wherever you are running the class.
• Store sample test data files to quickly test the code in $PROJ_HOME/test.

Setting classpath when compiling/running Java

Set the CLASSPATH environment variable to
- the directories having .class files
- the .jar files which contain relevant .class files

Then run javac and java; it will pick required the .class files from its location.

If you say

export CLASSPATH=dir1

and the .class file is dir1/dir11/abc.class, then you must say

java dir11.abc

to enable java to find abc.class.