How to stop Maven from overwriting if the destination exists

Question

I have a directory in a dependency, that I want copied in src/main/webapp/mypath during the initialize phase. But I want it to be copied exactly and only once, meaning that:

• if src/main/webapp/mypath doesn't exist, then copy from dependency
• if src/main/webapp/mypath exists, then never ever copy from dependency even if the one in the dependency is newer. If exists, don't overwrite it. Never.

I tried a couple of approaches with copy-resources and dependency:unpack but maven will always overwrite if mypath coming from the dependency is newer / updated even if I set to false every possible overwrite* configuration I'm aware of.

Any advice or RTFM + link to a manual I didn't read so far?

Answer 1

You can use profiles:

<profiles>
  <profile>
    <activation>
      <file>
        <missing>src/main/webapp/mypath</missing>
      </file>
    </activation>
    ... copy ...
  </profile>
</profiles>