Using a archetype is quite simple. Change to, or create, an empty directory for the new project. Then type:

$ quokka archetype

This will list all the currently available archetypes compatible with your quokka installation.

Available Archetypes
====================
quokka.archetype.depset:           0.2* 
    Archetype for a project that creates a dependency set
quokka.archetype.jar:              0.3* 
    Archetype for a Java project that creates a single .jar file
quokka.archetype.multiproject:     0.2* 
    Archetype for a Java project consisting of multiple modules (or sub-projects)
quokka.archetype.war:              0.1* 
    Archetype for building a Web Application (.war) file

If you're happy with the default selected version (marked with a star), you can then pick your desired archetype and execute it as follows:

$ quokka archetype -Darchetype=<archetypeId>

where:

For example, to create a new project that build a .jar file you can use:

$ quokka archetype -Darchetype=quokka.archetype.jar

This will create a project skeleton for you in the current directory that you can use as a starting point for your project.

It is also possible to create your own archetypes if you create multiple projects with a similar structure. However, you should use a dependency set instead if possible, as changes to a dependency set are automatically available to all projects that use it. Reserve archetypes for templates that have additional files or directory structures.

See the source code of the quokka.archetype.jar module for an example of how to build an archetype. It is really just a template directory with tokens defined for substitution when the archetype is extracted.