Apache ant property task

In Apache Ant, the "property" task is used to define a named property that can be used throughout the build file. The property task is used to assign a value to a property that can then be used by other tasks and targets in the build process.

Here is an example of how to use the property task:

<project name="myproject" default="build">
    <property name="src.dir" value="src"/>
    <property name="build.dir" value="build"/>
    
    <target name="compile">
        <javac srcdir="${src.dir}" destdir="${build.dir}"/>
    </target>
    
    <target name="build" depends="compile">
        <property name="jar.name" value="myproject.jar"/>
        <jar destfile="${build.dir}/${jar.name}">
            <fileset dir="${build.dir}">
                <include name="**/*.class"/>
            </fileset>
        </jar>
    </target>
</project>

In this example, the property task is used to define two properties, "src.dir" and "build.dir", with default values of "src" and "build", respectively. These properties are then used in the "compile" target to specify the source and destination directories for the "javac" task.

The property task is also used in the "build" target to define the name of the JAR file as the "jar.name" property. This property is then used in the "jar" task to specify the destination file for the JAR file.

Using properties in this way allows the build process to be more flexible and easier to maintain, as properties can be easily modified to change the behavior of the build without having to modify the build file itself.