JavaRCA: Java Recipe for Carefree dependency Administration

1. A Gradle or Maven project usually has one tool-specific file per module: module/build.gradle (Figure 1) or module/pom.xml (Figure 2). Technically, both tools allow all aspects of dependency management and build configuration to be defined there (and in many projects this is exploited). The solution is to treat these files purely as dependency definitions. The files then clearly show the dependencies of the corresponding module. Developers can internalize the notation for dependencies – dependencies { ... } (Figure 1) or <dependencies>...</dependencies> (Figure 2) – without having to be Gradle or Maven experts.
2. Java offers its own notation for dependencies as part of the Java Module System (JPMS) with module-info.java files. This allows dependencies to be defined directly in Java (Figure 4) and thus independently of the build tool. If you use a plugin that forwards the information from module-info.java files to the build tool, this information does not need to be repeated redundantly in the tool-specific files (build.gradle or pom.xml). These non-Java files can then be almost empty or even omitted entirely. Developers take care of the code and dependencies of a module directly in Java and have little contact with tool-specific notation in their daily work (Figure 3).

dependencies {
  api(platform("org.slf4j:slf4j-bom:2.0.17"))
}
dependencies.constraints {
  api("commons-io:commons-io:2.16.1")
  api("org.apache.commons:commons-csv:1.14.0")
}

<dependencyManagement>
  <dependencies>
    <dependency>
      <groupId>org.slf4j</groupId>
      <artifactId>slf4j-bom</artifactId>
      <version>2.0.17</version>
      <type>pom</type>
      <scope>import</scope>
    </dependency>
    <dependency>
      <groupId>commons-io</groupId>
      <artifactId>commons-io</artifactId>
      <version>2.16.1</version>
    </dependency>
    <dependency>
      <groupId>org.apache.commons</groupId>
      <artifactId>commons-csv</artifactId>
      <version>1.14.0</version>
    </dependency>
  </dependencies>
</dependencyManagement>

jvmDependencyConflicts {
  conflictResolution {
    select("org.gradlex:slf4j-impl", "org.slf4j:slf4j-simple")
  }
  patch {
    module("org.lwjgl:lwjgl") {
      addTargetPlatformVariant("natives", "natives-linux", LINUX, X86_64)
      addTargetPlatformVariant("natives", "natives-macos", MACOS, X86_64)
      addTargetPlatformVariant("natives", "natives-windows", WINDOWS, X86_64)
    }
  }
}

<dependencyManagement>
  <dependencies>
    <dependency>
      <groupId>de.javarca</groupId>
      <artifactId>javarca-engine</artifactId>
      <exclusions>
        <exclusion>
          <groupId>org.slf4j</groupId>
          <artifactId>slf4j-jdk14</artifactId>
        </exclusion>
      </exclusions>
    </dependency>
  </dependencies>
</dependencyManagement>