JH_LINKJARS(1)

💖 JH_LINKJARS 💖

okay bestie, welcome to jh_linkjars — a lil javahelper tool from the Javahelper manual, and honestly? she's a whole vibe. she populates folders with symlinks to jar files. that's the job. let's get into it 🫶

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✨ NAME ✨

jh_linkjars — populate folders with symlinks to jar files 💅

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

jh_linkjars [debhelper options]

jh_linkjars [debhelper options] directory

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✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

so here's the situation, and it's giving upstream did a thing 😭. If upstream ship convenience copies of third-party jar files which have been removed (see jh_repack(1)), but the build system still refers to that directory? yeah, that directory is now empty and the build is gonna be Big Mad. enter jh_linkjars — she populates that directory with symlinks to the packaged jars in /usr/share/java. icon behaviour, no cap. 👑

she gets called either with a directory right there on the command line, or by specifying one target directory per line in the file debian/linkjars. pick your fighter.

then jh_linkjars will scan all of the (installed) build-dependencies and create a symlink to every jar which is installed by those packages in the target directory. literally every single one. slay. ✨

and yes she can be called with -u to remove all the symlinks in the clean target — that's the unlink era. this is done automatically by jh_clean(1), so you don't even gotta lift a finger. 🧚

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✨ FILES ✨

• debian/linkjars — list of directories to populate; one directory per line. one. per. line. don't be chaotic about it. 🍓

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✨ OPTIONS ✨

• -t, --transitive — transitively link jar files, i.e. also include indirect dependencies in the target directory. she's going deeper. bestie is following the whole friend-of-a-friend chain. 🦋
• -u, --unlink — remove all files/links in the target directories that jh_linkjars created (or would have created). it's giving cleanup arc, and yes the "(or would have created)" part is doing exactly what it says. 🌸

and beyond the above, jh_linkjars also accepts the shared debhelper options documented in debhelper(7). shared options, shared energy, we love a collaborative queen. 💖

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✨ SEE ALSO ✨

• debhelper(7)

this program is a part of javahelper and uses debhelper as backend. there are also tutorials in /usr/share/doc/javahelper — go read them, they're lowkey helpful fr fr. 📚

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✨ AUTHOR ✨

Niels Thykier <niels@thykier.net> — we stan. 💜

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aaaand that's the whole page, bestie!! version 0.82, dated 2026-05-17, straight from the Javahelper corner of the world 🎀 go populate some directories and absolutely devour 💅✨