Gradle introduced the continuous build feature in version 2.5. The feature is still incubating, but we can already use it in our daily development. The continuous build feature means Gradle will not shut down after a task is finished, but keeps running and looks for changes to files to re-run tasks automatically. It applies perfectly for a scenario where we want to re-run the test task while we write our code. With the continuous build feature we start Gradle once with the test task and Gradle will automatically recompile source files and run tests if a source file changes.
To use the continuous build feature we must use the command line option --continuous or the shorter version -t. With this option Gradle will start up in continuous mode. To stop Gradle we must use the Ctrl+D key combination.
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In Gradle we can configure how duplicate files should be handled by the Copy task. Actually we can configure how duplicate files are handled by any task that implements the CopySpec interface. For example archive tasks also implements this interface. We must use the setDuplicatesStrategy method to configure how Gradle behaves. The parameter is a value of the enumeration DuplicatesStrategy. We can use the values from the enum class or use String values, which are automatically converted to enum DuplicatesStrategy values.
We can choose the following strategies:
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The nice thing about Gradle is that we can use Java libraries in our build script. This way we can add extra functionality to our build script in an easy way. We must use the classpath dependency configuration for our build script to include the library. For example we can include the library Grgit, which provides an easy way to interact with Git from Java or Groovy code. This library is also the basis for the Gradle Git plugin.
In the next example build file we add the Grgit library to our build script classpath. Then we use the open method of the Grgit class. From the returned object we invoke the head to get the commit id identified as id. With the abbreviatedId property we get the shorter version of the Git commit id. The build file also includes the application plugin. We customize the applicationDistribution CopySpec from the plugin and expand the properties in a VERSION file. This way our distribution always includes a plain text file VERSION with the Git commit id of the code.
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For Java or Groovy projects we can use the application plugin in Gradle to run and package our application. The plugin adds for example the startScripts task which creates OS specific scripts to run the project as a JVM application. This task is then used again by the installDist that installs the application, and distZip and distTar tasks that create a distributable archive of the application. The startScripts tasks has the properties unixScript and windowsScript that are the actual OS specific script files to run the application. We can use these properties to change the contents of the files.
In the following sample we add the directory configuration to the CLASSPATH definition:
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We currently use Vert.x in several internal and external projects. Until the most recent project we where building our Vert.x modules using Maven. Gradle is our build tool of choice, but the default approach described at the Vert.x site caused several issues:
- The task of cloning, cleaning and configuring the template project is error-prone;
- The template project does not support recent Gradle versions >= 2.x;
- This approach is not compatible with the Gradle support in IntelliJ IDEA.
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To define system properties for our Gradle build we can use the command line option --system-prop or -D. But we can also add the values for system properties in the gradle.properties file of our project. This file contains project properties we want to externalized, but if we prefix the property name with systemProp. the property is turned into a system property. For a multi-module build only system properties defined in the gradle.properties file in the root of the project structure are used, others are ignored.
In the following build script we have the task showSystemProperty. Inside the task we assert the value of the system property sample and the project property sample:
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Migrating from Ant to Gradle is very easy with the importBuild method from AntBuilder. We only have to add this single line and reference our existing Ant build XML file and all Ant tasks can now be executed as Gradle tasks. We can automatically rename the Ant tasks if we want to avoid task name collisions with Gradle task names. We use a closure argument with the importBuild method and return the new task names. The existing Ant task name is the first argument of the closure.
Let's first create a simple Ant build.xml file:
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If we run a Gradle build and one of the tasks fails, the whole build stops immediately. So we have fast feedback of our build status. If we don't want to this and want Gradle to execute all tasks, even though some might have failed, we use the command line option --continue. When we use the --continue command line option Gradle will execute every task where the dependent tasks are not failing. This is also useful in a multi-module project where we might want to build all projects even though some may have failing tests, so we get a complete overview of failed tests for all modules.
In the following Gradle build file we have two tasks. The task failTask throws a TaskExecutionException to purposely fail the task. The successTask will not fail:
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If we use Gradle in a multi-module project we can define project dependencies between modules. Gradle uses the information from the project dependencies to determine which tasks need to be run. For example if module B depends on module A and we want to build module B, Gradle will also build module A for us, because module B depends on it. But if we know for sure that module A is up to date and has not changed, we can also instruct Gradle to skip building module A, when we build module B.
Let's start with the following module structure, where each module depends on the module above it. So module services depends on common and module web depends on services:
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To get the current Gradle version we can use the gradleVersion property of the Gradle object. This returns a string value we can use for displaying the values. If we want to compare Gradle versions we can use the GradleVersion object. With this class we can get the current version, but we can also compare Gradle versions. This can be useful in our build scripts if we have functionality based on a Gradle version.
In the following build file we first have a task that uses the gradleVersion of Gradle. Then inside the task we use the static method current of the GradleVersion class. We get an GradleVersion instance and we display different properties from this instance. In the task compareGradleVersion we create a GradleVersion instance with the static version method. We compare multiple GradleVersion objects and have different functionality based on the Gradle version.
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To define a Copy task we specify the files we want to copy and to which directory. This definition is a CopySpec instance. It contains the rules that defines what we want to copy. The archive tasks Jar, Zip and Tar also use a CopySpec instance.
When we create a task of type Copy we get a task object that implements the CopySpec interface. We can use all the methods from this interface to extend our recipe for copying tasks. In the following build file we first define the task website. We use CopySpec methods to configure the task. Then we define a task deploy of type Sync that also implements the CopySpec interface.
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Gradle uses the name build.gradle as the default name for a build file. If we write our build code in a file build.gradle then we don't have to specify the build filename when we run tasks. We can create build files with a different name other than build.gradle. For example we can define our build logic in a file sample.gradle. To run the tasks from this build file we can use the command line option -b or --build-file followed by the file name. But we can also change the project settings and set a new default build file name for our project. With the changed project settings we do not have to use the command line options -b or --build-file.
Suppose we have the following build file with the name sample.gradle:
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