What does "java: No match." mean?

Question

When running java from the command line:

java -classpath bin:pellet-2.0.0/lib/* com.stuff.MyClass argumentTextStuff

I'm getting the following reply:

java: No match.

What's this mean? which java points to the expected file. And if I take the asterisk out, then I get the expected class not found error. Google searches aren't fruitful because I keep getting stuff about matching regexp patterns.

Answer 1

That is a bash (or whatever shell are you using) error message not a java one.

It means that "bin:pellet-2.0.0/lib/*" doesn't match any file.

Do not use wildcards in classpath.

Answer 2

If the * makes the difference, then the issue is probably related to how it's interpreted and by who. Try escaping it so that it's passed as is to java.

See also

• Java/Tutorials/Path and Class Path
• Java/Technical Article/Setting the class path (on Windows) (on setting up classpath wildcards)

Answer 3

Ah... already figured it out. It worked when I was using a bash shell, however the * is treated differently in the tcsh shell. So we switched to bash and it works. The reason is described here (per polygenelubricants's suggestion in the comments below).

Answer 4

With a unix Shell you often need to put such things in single or double quoted to ahold the Shell expanding the asterisk.