Maven is a Java project management tool.
The repository holds common libraries. These libraries must be installed into the repository. Under windows, the repository is normally found in:
c:\Documents and Settings\<User>\.maven\repository
Maven uses plugins to execute goals. Within a project's directory, a plugin is called as follows:
mavin <plugin>:<goal> e.g. maven java:compile
The plugins are written in Jelly
If a plugin has a default goal, it can be executed by:
maven <plugin>
%MAVEN_HOME%\bin\install_repo.bat %HOME%\.maven\repository
Installing jars
You can define where the remote repository is held by changing the maven.repo.remote value in project.properties
maven.repo.remote = http://www.ibiblio.org/maven
http://www.ibiblio.org/ is an open source maven repository,
Tell Eclipse where the Maven repository is by setting the MAVEN_REPO variable in Window→Preferences→Build Path→Classpath Variables. On Belfast the repository is in c:\java\maven-v.vv\repository
You can change into any maven-enabled project directories and type:
maven eclipse
and a .project and .classpath will be create automatically.
Import into Eclipse and rebuild
http://radio.weblogs.com/0112098/stories/2003/02/12/usingEclipseAndMaven.html