This is probably some sort of misunderstanding on my part, but I thought I'd check.
When executing a multi-module build, it appears that Maven will not detect that certain parent POMs in the project need to be built before an effective project scan can be completed. That is, suppose that you have a project structure with an aggregator, A, a module that is a parent pom, B, and a module that is a child of B (C). So A aggregates B and C; C extends from B. Assume also that (deliberately) the <parent> stanza does not have its <relativePath> set. (This is because in a large team with moderately skilled developers, there are all sorts of problems if the developer forgets to svn update B--the relative path of C's parent will pick up the workspace copy of B, not the most recent copy in the Maven repository.) If you run the reactor here it will use the repository copy of B, rather than realizing (as I think it should) that B is something that it can build to get a more recent copy. I would expect there to be a two-part scanning algorithm: first scan all modules and see if their parents are modules in the build. If so, then build those modules first. Then build the other projects in dependency order. Am I missing something? My apologies if so. Best, Laird -- http://about.me/lairdnelson
