Build Tools
Everyone uses Ant. It has the most robust offering currently out of all of the build systems available to a Java project. There are a few converts that prefer to use make because that is what they are comfortable with, and there are some who like to use Maven. Although Maven has a great deal of potential and if your team has the self-control to follow Maven’s strict rules then it should definitely be considered. Make, however, is extremely limited when it comes to the more complex build procedures that a J2EE project will require and invariably ends up as a difficult to maintain mess.
Avoid using any build tool that is development environment dependent. Although this topic will be discussed in further detail below, you do not want to force your developers to a single IDE or editor if it can be avoided.