Suppose, I have an opensource project that depends on some library, that must be patched in order to fix some issues. How do I do that? My ideas are:
Have that library sources set up as a module, keep them in my vcs. Pros: simple. Cons: some third party sources in my repo, might slow down build process, hard to find a patched place (though can be fixed in README)
Have a module, like in 1, but keep patched source files only, compile them with orignal library jar in classpath and somehow replace *.class files in library jar on build. Pros: builds faster, easy to find patched places. Cons: hard to configure, that jar hackery is non-obvious (library jar in repository and in my project assembly would be different)
Keep patched *.class files in main/resources, and replace on packaging like in 2). Pros: almost none. Cons: binaries in vcs, hard to recompile a patched class as patch compilation is not automated.
One nice solution is to create a distinct project with patched library sources, and deploy it on local/enterprise repository with -patched qualifier. But that would not fit for an opensourced project that is meant to be easily buildable by anyone who checks out its sources. Or should I just say "and also, before you build my project, please check out that stuff and run mvn install".
