Running an executable from a different working directory using ant -

is possible run executable ant using working directory other 1 contains executable? small ant project demonstrates i'm trying achieve.

folder structure

ant test |   build.xml |   bin |   |   debug |   |   |    program.exe |   |   release |   |   |    program.exe |   |   inputs |   |   |    ... |   |   outputs |   |   |    ... 

build.xml

<project name="test" basedir="./">         <target name="run">         <exec executable="${configuration}\program.exe" dir="bin"/>      </target> </project> 

${configuration} set release.

bin needs working directory executable can reference files in inputs , outputs correctly, want able run executable contained in bin/release bin directory. however, ant fails find executable:

build failed d:\ant test\build.xml:6: execute failed: java.io.ioexception: cannot run program "release\program.exe" (in directory "d:\ant test\bin"): createprocess error=2, system cannot find file specified 

i able work around on windows launching cmd.exe in bin directory , passing parameter release\program.exe, need able use ant file on multiple platforms, hoping find consistent syntax.

one option considered using conditional tasks , having separate syntaxes windows , unix. however, in actual project, exec statement occurs inside macro, , target calls macro large number of times. since conditions can affect things @ target level, have duplicate long list of macro calls each syntax wanted target, e.g.

<target name="runall" depends="runall-win,runall-unix"/>  <target name"runall-win" if="win">     <mymacro-win .../>     <!-- huge list of macro calls -->     ...     <mymacro-win .../> </target>  <target name"runall-unix" if="unix">     <mymacro-unix .../>     <!-- huge list of macro calls -->     ...     <mymacro-unix .../> </target> 

the dir attribute specifies working directory executable path resolved against project basedir. hence task search executable d:\ant test\release\program.exe.

a simple solution add resolveexecutable="true" task call:

<target name="run">     <exec executable="${configuration}\program.exe" dir="bin" resolveexecutable="true" />  </target> 

from exec task documentation:

when attribute true, name of executable resolved firstly against project basedir , if not exist, against execution directory if specified. on unix systems, if want allow execution of commands in user's path, set false. since ant 1.6