When we develop a software, we write, compile, test, package, and finally, distribute the code. We can automate these steps by using a build system. The big advantage is that we have a repeatable sequence of steps. The build system will always follow the steps that we have defined, so we can concentrate on writing the actual code and don't have to worry about the other steps.
Gradle is one such build system.
In this chapter, we will cover the following topics:
Getting started with Gradle
Writing our first build script
Looking at default tasks
Learning about command-line options
Discussing the Gradle graphical user interface
Gradle is a tool for build automation. With Gradle, we can automate compiling, testing, packaging, and deployment of our software or any other types of projects. Gradle is flexible, but has sensible defaults for most projects. This means that we can rely on the defaults if we don't want something special, but we can still can use the flexibility to adapt a build to certain custom needs.
Gradle is already used by large open source projects such as Spring, Hibernate, and Grails. Enterprise companies such as LinkedIn and Netflix also use Gradle.
In this chapter, we will explain what Gradle is and how to use it in our development projects.
Let's take a look at some of Gradle's features.