Many programmers have suffered when trying to setup an environment to handle updates for their application without much effort. Some tried Java Web Start for this purpose and many encountered difficulties with this approach.

Now there is getdown that aims to replace Java Web Start by offering a simple architecture to handle updates that is fast, realiable and the only thing you need is a normal http server. Though getdown lets us handle our updates really easy it is possible to make this process even easier with the getdown maven plugin.

In the following example we’re building a simple swing application to be installed, updated and launched using getdown.

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CoffeeScript is a neat language that is transcompiled into JavaScript but is more predictable and allows to write the same code with 1/3 fewer lines and of course with a (imho) nicer syntax.

CoffeeScript is nice but a vivid integration into our application build lifecycle with Maven is better  and that is what the following example is all about.

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