The Java platform brings a number of advanced programming tools and concepts to the developer. However collaborative build and development systems still don't take advantage of, and aren't tuned for, Java. Apache Ant, in use by many of the Apache Software Foundation's projects, is the first build tool to replace make (a tool designed for building C based projects) and introduces several key concepts which allows for faster, more efficient building of Java projects. Now a follow-on tool called Amber, designed by the original author of Ant, takes building, packaging, distributing, and managing Java based projects to the next level. This presentation gives an overview of the ways in which Java based projects are different from other types of projects and will explore in depth how Amber can help you build and manage your projects. In the presentation you will see hands on demonstrations of Amber building simple and very complex applications.