using log4j with the maven-jetty-plugin

pom.xml

            <!-- Run the application using "mvn jetty:run" -->
            <plugin>
                <groupId>org.mortbay.jetty</groupId>
                <artifactId>maven-jetty-plugin</artifactId>
                <version>6.1.9</version>
                <configuration>
                    <scanIntervalSeconds>5</scanIntervalSeconds>
                    <contextPath>/</contextPath>
                    <connectors>
                        <connector implementation="org.mortbay.jetty.nio.SelectChannelConnector">
                            <port>8088</port>
                            <maxIdleTime>60000</maxIdleTime>
                        </connector>
                    </connectors>
                    <webApp>${basedir}/target/classes</webApp>
                    <!-- Log to the console. -->
                    <requestLog implementation="org.mortbay.jetty.NCSARequestLog">
                        <filename>target/yyyy_mm_dd.request.log</filename>
                        <retainDays>90</retainDays>
                        <append>true</append>
                        <extended>true</extended>
                        <logTimeZone>GMT</logTimeZone>
                    </requestLog>

<!-- this is where the log4j.properties file should be found -->
                    <systemProperties>
                        <systemProperty>
                            <name>log4j.configuration</name>
                            <value>file:./target/classes/log4j.properties</value>
                        </systemProperty>
                    </systemProperties>

                </configuration>
            </plugin>

setting up the log4j.properties file avoids the dreaded log4j ERROS: "No appenders could be found for logger"

You can use systemProperties instead of -Dlog4j.configuration=file:./target/classes/log4j.properties