for this I use an Ant build script, (you can create a new Ant file in Eclipse, store it in your dynamic web project root and then right click > run on it when you want to run it from eclipse. Something like below. Basically copy your war to a directory, ${earDir} in the script below, and build that to an EAR (an EAR is just a type of JAR) :
<target name="buildEar" depends="init">
<copy tofile="${earDir}/" file="yourWarFile"/>
<copy tofile="${earDir}/META-INF/application.xml" file="localDirectory/application.xml"/>
<copy todir="${earDir}/META-INF">
<fileset dir="localDirectory" includes="was.policy" />
</copy>
<jar jarfile="localDir/something.ear" basedir="${earDir}">
<!-- Define the properties for the Manifest file. -->
<manifest>
<attribute name="Implementation-Vendor" value="Company name"/>
<attribute name="Implementation-Title" value="Application Title"/>
<attribute name="Implementation-Version" value="version and build number"/>
</manifest>
</jar>
</target>
Your was.policy file will be something like this (not good to give all permissions but you can change it later once you have it up and running):
//
// Template policy file for enterprise application.
// Extra permissions can be added if required by the enterprise application.
//
// NOTE: Syntax errors in the policy files will cause the enterprise application FAIL to start.
// Extreme care should be taken when editing these policy files. It is advised to use
// the policytool provided by the JDK for editing the policy files
// (WAS_HOME/java/jre/bin/policytool).
//
grant codeBase "file:${jars}" {
};
grant codeBase "file:${connectorComponent}" {
};
grant codeBase "file:${webComponent}" {
};
grant codeBase "file:${ejbComponent}" {
};
grant codeBase "file:${application}" {
permission java.security.AllPermission;
};
Your application.xml file will be something like this:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<application id="Application_ID" version="1.4" xmlns="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/j2ee" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:schemaLocation="http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/j2ee http://java.sun.com/xml/ns/j2ee/application_1_4.xsd">
<display-name>yourAppName</display-name>
<module id="WebModule_1240219352859">
<web>
<web-uri>yourWarFile.war</web-uri>
<context-root>urlToApplication</context-root>
</web>
</module>
</application>
The ids there should be ok they need to be unique per EAR I believe (or is it server cant remember).
I hope this helps.