BUILD SYSTEMS AND PACKAGE MANAGERS
Gradle
Article by:Geoffrey Hunter
Date Published: | |
Last Modified: |
Overview
Gradle is an open-source build automation system. It is primarily targeted towards languages running on the JVM (Java Virtual Machine).
One of it’s big advantages over Maven is it’s use of a domain-specific language (DSL) rather than XML to specify the project configuration and build steps.
The Java Plugin
The Java plugin is probably one of the most commonly used plugins. To use the plugin, add the following to your build script:
apply plugin: 'java'
The Java plugin assumes the same traditional layout of files that Maven did:
Directory | Meaning |
---|---|
src/main/java | Production Java source |
src/main/resources | Production resources |
src/test/java | Test Java source |
src/test/resources | Test resources |
src/_`sourceSet`_/java | Java source for the given source set |
src/_`sourceSet`_/resources | Resources for the given source set |
These default file locations can be changed if needed (however, it is recommended to use the default configuration unless you have good reason not to).
Authors

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License .