Including and excluding files and directories

When specifying a resource directory, every file within that directory may not be used. Thus, we may have to specify only the files that we want to include or specify the files that we want to exclude.

To include a resource, we only need to add an <includes> element.

<project>
  ...
  <name>My Resources Plugin Practice Project</name>
  ...
  <build>
    ...
    <resources>
      <resource>
        <directory> [your directory] </directory>
        <includes>
          <include> [resource file #1] </include>
          <include> [resource file #2] </include>
          <include> [resource file #3] </include>
          ...
          <include> [resource file #n] </include>
        </includes>
      </resource>
      ...
    </resources>
    ...
  </build>
  ...
</project>

And to exclude a resource, we only need to add an <excludes> element.

<project>
  ...
  <name>My Resources Plugin Practice Project</name>
  ...
  <build>
    ...
    <resources>
      <resource>
        <directory> [your directory] </directory>
        <excludes>
          <exclude> [non-resource file #1] </exclude>
          <exclude> [non-resource file #2] </exclude>
          <exclude> [non-resource file #3] </exclude>
          ...
          <exclude> [non-resource file #n] </exclude>
        </excludes>
      </resource>
      ...
    </resources>
    ...
  </build>
  ...
</project>

For example, if we want to include all text and RTF files under our src/my-resources directory and in all its subdirectories, we can do the following:

<project>
  ...
  <name>My Resources Plugin Practice Project</name>
  ...
  <build>
    ...
    <resources>
      <resource>
        <directory> src/my-resources </directory>
        <includes>
          <include> **/*.txt </include>
          <include> **/*.rtf </include>
        </includes>
      </resource>
      ...
    </resources>
    ...
  </build>
  ...
</project>

Also, if we want to include everything except the bitmaps, jpegs, and gifs, we can simply exclude them by:

<project>
  ...
  <name>My Resources Plugin Practice Project</name>
  ...
  <build>
    ...
    <resources>
      <resource>
        <directory> src/my-resources </directory>
        <excludes>
          <exclude> **/*.bmp </exclude>
          <exclude> **/*.jpg </exclude>
          <exclude> **/*.jpeg </exclude>
          <exclude> **/*.gif </exclude>
        </excludes>
      </resource>
      ...
    </resources>
    ...
  </build>
  ...
</project>

Of course, we can also have both <includes> and <excludes> elements. For example, if we want to include all text files that does not contain the word "test" in their filename.

<project>
  ...
  <name>My Resources Plugin Practice Project</name>
  ...
  <build>
    ...
    <resources>
      <resource>
        <directory> src/my-resources </directory>
        <includes>
          <include> **/*.txt </include>
        </inclues>
        <excludes>
          <exclude> **/*test*.* </exclude>
        </excludes>
      </resource>
      ...
    </resources>
    ...
  </build>
  ...
</project>