Maven skip tests

I am using Maven 2.2.1 and to build my project I used this command

mvn clean install -Dmaven.test.skip=true

However, the build failed saying it couldn't find one of the artifact. However, when I used:

mvn clean install -DskipTests

everything worked fine.

So far I have been thinking that these 2 commands are equivalent. However, this link seems to suggest that -Dmaven.test.skip=true also skips compiling the test cases.

However, that still didn't explain to me why one command is working and another is not. Will be thankful if anyone please explain this to me.

As you noted, -Dmaven.test.skip=true skips compiling the tests. More to the point, it skips building the test artifacts. A common practice for large projects is to have testing utilities and base classes shared among modules in the same project.

This is accomplished by having a module require a test-jar of a previously built module:

<dependency>
  <groupId>org.myproject.mygroup</groupId>
  <artifactId>common</artifactId>
  <version>1.0</version>
  <type>test-jar</type>
  <scope>test</scope>
</dependency>

If -Dmaven.test.skip=true (or simply -Dmaven.test.skip) is specified, the test-jars aren't built, and any module that relies on them will fail its build.

In contrast, when you use -DskipTests, Maven does not run the tests, but it does compile them and build the test-jar, making it available for the subsequent modules.

I had some inter-dependency with the tests in order to build the package.

The following command manage to override the need for the test artifact in order to complete the goal:

mvn -DskipTests=true  package

There is a difference between each parameter.

• The -DskipTests skip running tests phase, it means at the end of this process you will have your tests compiled.

• The -Dmaven.test.skip=true skip compiling and running tests phase.

As the parameter -Dmaven.test.skip=true skip compiling you don't have the tests artifact.

For more information just read the surfire documentation: http://maven.apache.org/plugins-archives/maven-surefire-plugin-2.12.4/examples/skipping-test.html

To skip the test case during maven clean install i used -DskipTests paramater in following command

mvn clean install -DskipTests

into terminal window