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Building RPMs with Maven for Reliable Software Deployment

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This article explains how to package applications as revisionable RPM artifacts using Maven, a technique that remains valuable for DevOps and platform engineering teams who operate in controlled, reproducible, or air-gapped environments. It covers prerequisites, rpm-maven-plugin configuration, directory mappings, permissions, and how to integrate RPM creation into CI pipelines to deliver consistent deployment units for Java services.

Modern DevOps Packaging: Building RPMs with Maven for Reliable Software Deployment

In modern DevOps and platform engineering, one of the most underrated tools is still the RPM. Even with the rise of containers, many organizations rely on RPM-based delivery to manage internal services, JVM applications, and deployment flows in secure or air-gapped environments. A revisionable, reproducible, OS-native package is often the cleanest way to promote artifacts through development, staging, and production.

Back in 2015, the motivation was simple: create a dependable deployment mechanism that supports installation, upgrades, and rollbacks. That need has not gone away. Today, with CI/CD pipelines and infrastructure automation everywhere, packaging software as an RPM is still a valid and often required delivery method.

Prerequisites

To build RPMs with Maven, you need the following environment:

  • A Linux system such as Red Hat, AlmaLinux, or CentOS
  • Maven installed and working via mvn
  • Git available on the command line
  • RPM build tools installed:
    sudo yum install rpm-build

The workflow is especially useful for Java web applications where the build produces a .war or other deployable artifact.

Building the Project

Before creating the RPM, ensure the project builds successfully so that the target output is available locally. If local tests fail due to missing dependencies (like MongoDB, Tomcat, etc.), you can bypass them with: 

mvn clean install -DskipTests

The rpm-maven-plugin uses several parameters to determine how your files should be installed on the target system:

  • directory — where the files will be installed
  • filemode — file permissions for deployment
  • username and groupname — ownership of installed files
  • location — the build-artifact source location

Configuring the RPM Plugin in Your pom.xml

Add the following plugin configuration to your Maven build: 

<project>
  ...
  <build>
    <plugins>
      <plugin>
        <groupId>org.codehaus.mojo</groupId>
        <artifactId>rpm-maven-plugin</artifactId>
        <executions>
          <execution>
            <id>generate-rpm</id>
            <goals>
              <goal>rpm</goal>
            </goals>
          </execution>
        </executions>

        <configuration>
          <license>Apache</license>
          <distribution>Development</distribution>
          <group>Applications/Internet</group>
          <packager>ALO</packager>

          <defineStatements>
            <defineStatement>_unpackaged_files_terminate_build 0</defineStatement>
          </defineStatements>

          <mappings>
            <mapping>
              <directory>/var/lib/tomcat/webapps</directory>
              <filemode>600</filemode>
              <username>tomcat</username>
              <groupname>tomcat</groupname>
              <directoryIncluded>false</directoryIncluded>
              <sources>
                <source>
                  <location>target/test.war</location>
                </source>
              </sources>
            </mapping>
          </mappings>

          <preinstallScriptlet>
            <script>echo "Deploying test-api webapp"</script>
          </preinstallScriptlet>
        </configuration>
      </plugin>
    </plugins>
  </build>
</project>

Building and Inspecting the RPM

Run the RPM build step: 

mvn rpm:rpm

After the build completes, you can inspect the RPM contents using: 

rpm -q --filesbypkg -p target/rpm/<build-name>/RPMS/noarch/test-api-0.0.1-1.noarch.rpm

This ensures that the packaging layout, permissions, ownership, and file placement match what you expect before deploying the artifact to production environments or CI-based promotion pipelines.

Why This Still Matters in 2025

Even in a world dominated by containers, building RPMs remains a practical approach for teams working with legacy systems, controlled production environments, or hybrid setups where OS-level packaging is still the most reliable delivery path. Maven provides an easy and repeatable way to create these artifacts, making RPM packaging a natural fit in modern CI/CD workflows.

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