title: "Failed to read artifact descriptor" when compiling maven-dependency-plugin:
body: <p>I need to make a change to the maven dependency plugin to satisfy unique requirements in my organization. </p>
  
  <p>I've downloaded the sources from <a href="http://maven.apache.org/plugins/maven-dependency-plugin/download.cgi" rel="nofollow">http://maven.apache.org/plugins/maven-dependency-plugin/download.cgi</a></p>
  
  <p>When I look at its pom, I see that it defines a parent pom like this: </p>
  
  <pre><code>&lt;parent&gt;
      &lt;artifactId&gt;maven-plugins&lt;/artifactId&gt;
      &lt;groupId&gt;org.apache.maven.plugins&lt;/groupId&gt;
      &lt;version&gt;27&lt;/version&gt;
      &lt;relativePath&gt;../maven-plugins/pom.xml&lt;/relativePath&gt;
    &lt;/parent&gt;
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>This leads me to the understanding that this project cannot be built independently, at least not the version I have.</p>
  
  <p>When trying to run mvn clean install anyway I get the following error: </p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p>Couldn't download artifact: Failed to read artifact descriptor for
    org.apache.maven:maven-model:jar:2.0.9</p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>The funny thing is that it actually does exist in my local .m2 repository.</p>
  
  <p>Is it really the case that if I want to make a contribution or a change to a maven plugin I have to have the entire environment or is there a way to build it independently?</p>
  
  <p>I am using maven 3.0.4 and Nexus.</p>