First I downloaded the binary install from http://ant.apache.org/bindownload.cgi
Then I extracted the files into a directory (e:Ant)
Then I set the Following environment variables at Control Panel>System>Advanced>Environment Variables
At system varibles, Press new and enter ‘ANT_HOME’ for the name and enter the ant directory(e:Ant) for the value
Press Ok
Press New again and enter ‘JAVA_HOME’ for the name and enter the directory path to your java installation(E:Program FilesJavajdk1.5.0_01)
Press OK
Select Path from the list and press edit.
add ‘;%ANT_HOME%bin’ at then end of the current value
That is all you need to do to get ant working on your computer. Further details is at http://ant.apache.org/manual/index.html or http://ant.apache.org/
Its a shame java is sometimes made unecesarily complex. It took a while to understand and documentation was not easy. Hopefully in the future java projects will be more beginner friendly