Exec Maven Plugin 3.7.0 raises the minimum Maven version to 3.9.0, adds three long-requested exec:java options, and fixes a batch of old bugs in how commands and Java programs are started. Java 8 is still enough to run it. Builds on Maven 3.6.3 to 3.8.x must stay on 3.6.4.

✨ Highlights

• Maven 3.9.0 or later is required (#548). Older Maven versions fail at startup with a prerequisite error.
• classpathDependencyExcludes removes chosen dependencies from the class path of exec:java and exec:exec (#562, requested in #68 by @pramodanarase).
• mainClass from the manifest. When executableDependency is set and mainClass is not, the Main-Class attribute of that dependency's manifest is used (#563, #89 by @sewe).
• keepClassLoaderOpen leaves the exec:java class loader open after the program returns, so shutdown hooks and background threads can still load classes (#561, #513 by @tzaeschke).
• exec:java threading. The main class runs in a non-daemon bootstrap thread that the plugin waits for, so IDE builds such as m2e no longer interrupt it (#572, #526 by @sbj42). A program's own UncaughtExceptionHandler now receives its uncaught exceptions (#569, #141 by @dedeibel).
• exec:exec fixes. async together with outputFile keeps the output file open until the process ends (#565, #63 by @tarioch). A relative executable resolves against workingDirectory again (#567, #92 by @deepakab03). Unquoted line breaks and tabs in commandlineArgs count as spaces instead of creating empty arguments (#571, #466 by @cebaa). A failed command logs its message at error level and keeps the stack trace for -X (#568).
• Module path. Resource directories stay off the module path (#560, #534 by @inaldt), and the %modulepath token is handled (#532 by @pzygielo).
• Documentation moved from APT to Markdown, and the module path argument file is now documented (#557, #566).

🚨 Removed

• Require Maven 3.9.0 (#548) @slachiewicz

🚀 New features and improvements

• Add keepClassLoaderOpen to exec:java (#561) @slachiewicz
• Add classpathDependencyExcludes (#562) @slachiewicz
• Read mainClass from the executableDependency manifest (#563) @slachiewicz

🐛 Bug Fixes

• Log only the message of a failed command at error level (#568) @slachiewicz
• Pass uncaught exceptions to the handlers of the program (#569) @slachiewicz
• Resolve a relative executable against the working directory (#567) @slachiewicz
• Treat unquoted line breaks and tabs in the arguments as spaces (#571) @slachiewicz
• Run the main class in a non-daemon bootstrap thread (#572) @slachiewicz
• Keep the output file open for asynchronous executions (#565) @slachiewicz
• Keep resource directories off the module path (#560) @slachiewicz
• Handle %modulepath token (#532) @pzygielo

📝 Documentation updates

• Document the module path argument file (#566) @slachiewicz
• Convert the site documents from APT to Markdown (#557) @slachiewicz
• Add AGENTS.md (#552) @slachiewicz

👻 Maintenance

• Ignore JVM option notices in the mexec-86 output check (#564) @slachiewicz
• Declare the Maven artifacts the code uses (#553) @slachiewicz
• Remove redundant mojo.java.target property (#554) @slachiewicz
• Keep Dependabot on Maven 3.9.x (#550) @slachiewicz
• Keep plexus-xml on 3.x in Dependabot (#541) @slachiewicz

🔧 Build

• Resolve the heaviest plugins of setup-parent in the main build (#559) @slachiewicz
• Reuse the cached prefix file in the integration tests (#558) @slachiewicz
• Use the runners' cached Temurin JDKs in CI (#551) @slachiewicz
• Serve the plexus-utils fixture dependency from a mock repository (#549) @slachiewicz
• Assign merged pull requests to the release milestone (#547) @slachiewicz
• Check dependencies monthly and group the updates (#546) @slachiewicz
• Run fewer JDKs on macOS and Windows and the ITs in parallel (#545) @slachiewicz
• Keep Dependabot off Mockito 5 (#543) @slachiewicz

📦 Dependency updates

• Bump the maven group with 4 updates (#555) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump asm.version from 9.10.1 to 9.11 (#544) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump org.codehaus.plexus:plexus-xml from 3.0.1 to 3.1.0 (#542) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump org.codehaus.plexus:plexus-utils from 3.0.24 to 3.6.1 in /src/it/projects/modulepath-from-cli (#539) @dependabot[bot]
• Keep plexus-xml on 3.x in Dependabot (#541) @slachiewicz

Thanks to @pzygielo and @slachiewicz.

Full changelog

📝 Documentation updates

• Fix typo in docs (#531) @pzygielo

👻 Maintenance

• Ignore Maven Resolver >= 2.0 and SLF4J >= 2.0 in Dependabot (#538) @slachiewicz
• Stop dependabot from updating test fixtures (#535) @slachiewicz
• Add IT using custom plugin repository (#497) @Marcono1234

📦 Dependency updates

📝 Documentation updates

• Document thread group isolation limitation in java goal (#503) @copilot-swe-agent[bot]

👻 Maintenance

• JUnit 5 best practices (#505) @slachiewicz
• Move ExecJavaMojoTest, ExecMojoTest to JUnit 5 (#502) @slawekjaranowski
• Add support for JEP 512 for for package-private static main method (#499) @anuragagarwal561994
• Move to JUnit 5 (#501) @slawekjaranowski

📦 Dependency updates

• Bump asm.version from 9.9 to 9.9.1 (#509) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump org.apache.commons:commons-exec from 1.5.0 to 1.6.0 (#508) @dependabot[bot]

🚀 New features and improvements

• Add JPMS ServiceLoader Support with Multi-Release JAR (#500) @ascheman

📦 Dependency updates

• Bump asm.version from 9.8 to 9.9 (#498) @dependabot[bot]

🐛 Bug Fixes

• Revert change from #480 - plugin dependencies must be resolved from plugin repositories (#496) @slawekjaranowski

📦 Dependency updates

• Bump org.codehaus.mojo:mojo-parent from 93 to 94 (#495) @dependabot[bot]

🚀 New features and improvements

• [ExecMojo]Add getShebang method to correctly set the command line executable name (#487) @uchenily
• JEP 512 Support (#484) @cayhorstmann

🐛 Bug Fixes

• fix inheritIo option (#488) @dernasherbrezon
• Fix for #479 - Wrong repositories used to collect deps (#480) @cstamas

👻 Maintenance

• Use JSR-330 for component injection (#493) @slawekjaranowski
• Re-run failed tests (#491) @slawekjaranowski
• Restore default matrix build (#486) @slawekjaranowski

📦 Dependency updates

• Use Maven 3.9.11 in dependencies, still requires 3.6.3 as minimum (#492) @slawekjaranowski
• Bump org.codehaus.mojo:mojo-parent from 92 to 93 (#483) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump org.codehaus.mojo:mojo-parent from 91 to 92 (#478) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump org.codehaus.mojo:mojo-parent from 90 to 91 (#477) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump org.codehaus.mojo:mojo-parent from 89 to 90 (#476) @dependabot[bot]

🐛 Bug Fixes

• Add ClassLoader support for ASM ClassWriter (#472) @slawekjaranowski

📦 Dependency updates

• Bump org.codehaus.mojo:mojo-parent from 88 to 89 (#475) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump org.codehaus.mojo:mojo-parent from 87 to 88 (#474) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump org.apache.commons:commons-exec from 1.4.0 to 1.5.0 (#473) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump commons-io:commons-io from 2.7 to 2.14.0 in /src/test/projects/project6/project5lib (#470) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump commons-io:commons-io from 2.7 to 2.14.0 in /src/test/projects/project1 (#468) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump asm.version from 9.7.1 to 9.8 (#467) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump commons-io:commons-io from 2.7 to 2.14.0 in /src/test/projects/project2 (#465) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump commons-io:commons-io from 2.7 to 2.14.0 in /src/test/projects/project14 (#464) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump commons-io:commons-io from 2.7 to 2.14.0 in /src/test/projects/project3 (#463) @dependabot[bot]
• Bump org.codehaus.mojo:mojo-parent from 86 to 87 (#460) @dependabot[bot]

👻 Maintenance

• Fix ITs for Maven 4 rc-3 (#462) @slawekjaranowski
• Document how to use env vars in commandlineArgs (#459) @cpfeiffer

🚀 New features and improvements

• Add toolchain java path to environment variables in ExecMojo (#455) @michalm2000

🐛 Bug Fixes

• #322, enable to control the exec:java interaction with JVM classloader more finely (#337) @rmannibucau

📦 Dependency updates

• Bump org.codehaus.mojo:mojo-parent from 85 to 86 (#445) @dependabot
• Bump commons-io:commons-io from 2.7 to 2.14.0 in /src/it/projects/project6/project5lib (#451) @dependabot
• Bump asm.version from 9.7 to 9.7.1 (#452) @dependabot
• Bump commons-io:commons-io from 2.7 to 2.14.0 in /src/it/projects/setup-parent (#450) @dependabot
• Bump commons-io:commons-io from 2.7 to 2.14.0 in /src/test/projects/project13 (#449) @dependabot
• Bump org.codehaus.plexus:plexus-utils from 4.0.1 to 4.0.2 (#447) @dependabot

👻 Maintenance

• Update site descriptor to 2.0.0 (#457) @slawekjaranowski
• Toolchains manual improvements (#456) @slawekjaranowski
• Manage version of maven-toolchains-plugin (#454) @slawekjaranowski

🐛 Bug Fixes

• Environment variable Path should be used as case-insensitive (#442) @slawekjaranowski
• fix: NPE because declared MavenSession field hides field of superclass (#439) @sebthom

📦 Dependency updates

• Bump org.codehaus.mojo:mojo-parent from 84 to 85 (#441) @dependabot

👻 Maintenance

• Remove redundant spotless configuration (#440) @slawekjaranowski

🔧 Build

• Use Maven4 enabled with GH Action (#443) @slawekjaranowski
• Use shared release drafter GH Action (#444) @slawekjaranowski

🚀 New features and improvements

• Allow <includePluginDependencies> to be specified for the exec:exec goal (#432) @sebthom

🐛 Bug Fixes

• Do not get UPPERCASE env vars (#427) @wheezil

📦 Dependency updates

• Bump org.codehaus.mojo:mojo-parent from 82 to 84 (#434) @dependabot
• Bump org.codehaus.plexus:plexus-xml from 3.0.0 to 3.0.1 (#431) @dependabot

👻 Maintenance

• Remove Log4j 1.2.x from ITs (#437) @slawekjaranowski

🔧 Build

• Use Maven 3.9.7 and 4.0.0-beta-3 (#433) @slawekjaranowski