I need to get all my dependencies for a module into a single, runnable directory. This is part of a build pipeline I'm trying out, that runs my modules in docker. I'm aware of the Shadow Jar plugin, but that feels a little heavy for something that will run with every change. Plus the tool is using

rsync

which is smart enough to determine changes per file, so it's probably faster to have small class files, and jars from maven. What would be the best way to do this?

I would practically never use the shadow plugin for anything. You can use the

application

plugin to get a proper distributable archive (or directory) that then also is

rsync

friendly

Grab the

runtimeClasspath

and copy all the jars somewhere?

Amongst other things, yes. It also creates start scripts for *nix and windows, provides tasks to create a distributable zip and tar.gz, ...

there’s an example of how to manually create a fat jar in the docs https://docs.gradle.org/current/userguide/working_with_files.html#sec:creating_uber_jar_example, but I agree that the

application

plugin is best

If really needing to build a bad-practice fat jar, use the shadow plugin at least. It at least sails around some of the bloody pitfalls even if not around all. The example from the docs cares about none of them. A better way to build a fat jar would be like spring boot builds fat jars. But imho there is almost no case where a fat jar is a good idea. 🙂

wow -

installDist

seems like exactly what I was hoping for.

Why is that odd? Usually you want to run your application.

If you are only interested in the distribution not the starting scripts you can stick with the

distribution

plugin https://docs.gradle.org/current/userguide/distribution_plugin.html

Just wasn't what I was expecting. I guess it's fine. I suppose without the shell script, running things directly with the

java

command would be difficult.