This document summarizes the key points about Gradle build automation tool. It discusses some limitations of Ant and Maven, how Gradle addresses them using Groovy as its configuration language. Gradle provides features like caching, daemon, plugins, and integration with Maven. It offers better performance than Maven for multi-project builds. The document compares Gradle and Maven build times on sample projects and outlines some pros and cons of Gradle.

1. Gradle 2.
Breaking stereotypes
Sergey Morenets, morenets@mail.ru
June, 17 2015

2. About author
• Works in IT since 2000
• 11 year of Java SE/EE experience
• Regular speaker at Java conferences
• Author of “Development of Java applications” and
“Main errors in Java programming ”books
• Founder of http://it-simulator.com
• 3 years of Gradle usage

3. Agenda

4. Agenda

5. Apache Ant
• Offers extreme flexibility
• Imposes no convention or project standards
• Maintenance headache
• Support Ruby, Groovy, JavaScript, Judoscript,
Jython scripting

6. Apache Ivy
• Agile dependency manager
• Transitive dependencies
• Ant & Maven integration
• Enhanced support of repositories

7. Apache Maven
• Support for dependency management
• Standard project layout
• Archetypes
• Hard customization
• Declarative approach
• Plugin execution framework

8. Build systems

9. Apache Maven

10. Ant plugin

14. Groovy plugin

16. Echo plugin

18. Gradle

21. Maven

22. Gradle

23. Gradle

26. Maven

27. Gradle

29. Issue #1. XML
• Large and complex files are hard to understand
• Hierarchical structure limits the expressiveness
of the format
• Good format for the data and complex for the flow

30. Hans Dockter
• Founder of Gradle and Gradleware
• 13 years of experience as a software developer,
team leader, architect, trainer, and mentor
• Previously worked at Jboss and founded Jboss-IDE
• Holds a Diploma in Physics with a minor in Computer
Science
• Admirer of domain-driven-design

31. Slogan
• Make the impossible possible
• Make the possible easy
• Make the easy elegant

32. Solution #1. Groovy
• An agile and dynamic language for the Java
Virtual Machine
• Makes modern programming features available to
Java developers with almost-zero learning curve
• Provides the ability to statically type
check and statically compile your code for
robustness and performance
• Share base syntax, type system, packages
hierarchy with Java
• Every Gradle build file is Groovy script

33. Gradle

34. Gradle
• Development started in Apr 2008
• Current version 2.4 released in May 2015
• Default build tool for Android OS

35. Gradle overview
• A flexible general purpose build tool
• Programming tool
• Declarative builds and build-by-convention
• Multi-project support
• Powerful dependency management

36. Development
Version Release date
Maven 1.0 2004
Maven 2.0 2005
Maven 3.0 2010
Maven 3.1 2013
Maven 3.3 2015

37. Development
Version Release date
Gradle 0.7 2009
Gradle 1.0 2012
Gradle 1.5 2013
Gradle 2.0 2014
Gradle 2.4 2015

38. Build structure

39. Hello world
$ gradle helloWorld

40. build.gradle

41. Maven pom

42. Sample project

43. Sample project

44. Custom task
• Writes audit information at the end of the build
• Audit information includes project name and build
timestamp
• Audit files are located in the separate folder

45. Custom task

46. Custom task

48. Cache everything
• Remote metadata and artifacts
• Transitive dependency resolution
• Build execution plan
• Plugin inputs and outputs
• Test results

49. Daemon
• Improves startup and execution time of Gradle
• Initial Gradle command forks daemon process
• Subsequent Gradle commands reuse the build
daemon
• If daemon is currently busy then new daemon
process is started on-demand
• Useful for small tasks execution
• Expires after 3 hours of idle time

50. gradle.properties
• org.gradle.daemon=true
• org.gradle.configureondemand=true
• org.gradle.parallel=true
• org.gradle.java.home=C:Program
FilesJavajdk1.8.0_45
• org.gradle.jvmargs=-Xmx100m

51. Test execution
# of threads H2 – time(sec) MySQL – time(sec)
1 24,4 27,5
2 31,1 36,9
4 46,2 51,1
8 71,1 80,5

52. Plugin
• Reusable pieces of build logic
• Can be used in different projects/builds

54. Plugin portal

55. Custom plugin
gradle helloWorld

56. Maven

57. Gradle

58. Integrates with everything

59. Gradle and Maven

60. Comparison
• Maven 3.3.3
• Gradle 2.4
• JDK 1.8.0.45
• Intel Core i7, 4 cores, 16 GB
• Multi-project and single project builds
• Optimized and default modes

61. Multi-project
Operation Gradle
(opt)
Gradle
(daemon)
Gradle(no
daemon)
Maven Maven
(parall)
Build(sec) 8,03 10,73 13,68 12,40 13,02
Inc build(sec) 1,92 2,16 4,74 4,62 4,64
Clean(sec) 1,03 1,20 2,77 1,71 1,70

62. Gradle
Optimized Not optimized

63. Maven
Optimized Not optimized

64. Single project
Operation Gradle
(opt)
Gradle
(daemon)
Gradle(no
daemon)
Maven Maven
(parall)
Build(sec) 1,41 1,46 4,55 2,38 2,37
Inc build(sec) 0,95 1,01 3,27 0,88 0,86
Clean(sec) 0,89 0,95 2,68 0,24 0,19

65. Maven converter
• maven2Gradle is obsolete now
• Build init plugin converts:
o POM settings
o Dependencies
o Properties
o Java compiler settings
o Single- and multi-project settings
o Packaging of sources and tests

66. Repositories

68. Maven Scope

69. Maven Scope

70. Configurations

71. Version management

72. Version management

73. Profiles
• build.gradle
• dev-profile.gradle
• test-profile.gradle
• $ gradle –Pprofile=dev build

74. Skip tasks
• $ gradle -PskipTests

75. Caching
• Gradle caches all compiles scripts by default
• Compiled scripts are put into .gradle folder
• Gradle uses compiled version if the script hasn’t
changed
• --recompile-scripts option discards cache

76. Wrapper
• Preferred way of starting a Gradle build
• Gradle will be automatically downloaded via
wrapper
• Includes shell script
• Useful for CI tasks

78. Pros
• Native Java/Scala/Groovy support
• Ant/Maven/Ivy integration
• Full IDE support
• Flexible DSL
• Multiple third-party plugins(70+)
• Declarative & imperative approaches
• Rapid development
• Performance

79. Cons
• Compilation & run-time issues
• Larger learning curve
• Less community & industry support

80. Future

81. Practice
• https://github.com/hibernate/hibernate-orm
• https://github.com/SpringSource/spring-framework
• https://github.com/gradle/gradle

82. Q&A
• Sergey Morenets, morenets@mail.ru