I've been reading the documentation online a little more carefully and now understand the build process a bit better.

When building this stuff from svn the jars need to be signed or the java admin client won't work. A number of parameters can be to the "./build.sh" command which are useful to remember (from ./build.sh -projecthelp):

Main targets:

all Build all
clean Cleanup
compile Compiles the source code
compile-tomcat-realm Compile the Tomcat realm
dist-tgz Create dist-tgz
dist-war Create war file
dist-zip Create dist-zip
download-additional-jars Download optional third-party jar files.
installer Create installer
jar Create eXist unsigned jar files
javadocs Create javadoc
jdepend Run jdepend
jetty-keygen Generate keystore for jetty.
jnlp-clean Delete new files.
jnlp-keygen Generate keystore for signing jars.
jnlp-pack200 Pack all jar files.
jnlp-sign-all Sign all jar files.
jnlp-sign-core Sign all CORE jar files.
jnlp-sign-exist Sign all EXIST jar files.
jnlp-unsign-all Sign all jar files. *note: I think this should read "unsign"
pmd Run PMD
rebuild Rebuild all
samples Create samples
snapshot-installer Create snapshot installer
svn-download Download SVN library. *note that this does not do an svn checkout
test Run jUnit tests
Default target: all