NEW PROJECT ANNOUNCEMENT: blowdryer

[nedtwigg]

So you apply Spotless to a single-project build, and it looks like this:

// build.gradle
spotless { java {
  eclipse().configFile 'spotless.eclipseformat.xml'
}}

Then you have a multi-project build, so you factor out your spotless block into gradle/spotless.gradle:

// subproject/build.gradle
apply from: rootProject.file('gradle/spotless.gradle')

// gradle/spotless.gradle
spotless { java {
  // don't forget the 'rootProject.file()', or it won't work!
  eclipse().configFile rootProject.file('gradle/spotless.eclipseformat.xml')
}}

The chinese character for "dry" is 干. If you apply the blowdryer plugin, it lets you rewrite the above, but with fewer characters:

// subproject/build.gradle
apply from: 干.file('spotless.gradle')

// gradle/spotless.gradle
spotless { java {
  eclipse().configFile 干.file('gradle/spotless.eclipseformat.xml')
}}

But that's mostly a gimmick. The power is that - if you want - you can move spotless.gradle and spotless.eclipseformat.xml into a new git repository (a "script repository"), and you can point many different gradle builds to it. The convention is to name your script repository blowdryer-{orgname}. So if you put your gradle scripts and config files into diffplug/blowdryer-diffplug, then you can consume those scripts from other builds by doing this:

// settings.gradle
blowdryerSetup {
    github 'diffplug/blowdryer-diffplug', 'tag', '2.0.0' // can also use commit SHA
    //devLocal '../blowdryer-diffplug' // for local development
}

// subproject/build.gradle
apply from: 干.file('spotless.gradle')

// github.com/acme/blowdryer-acme/src/main/resources/spotless.gradle
spotless { java {
  eclipse().configFile 干.file('gradle/spotless.eclipseformat.xml')
}}

Performance-wise, because git commits and tags are immutable, it only needs to download the file once, ever, system-wide, so there's no measurable overhead in using it.

There's also a little more power you can tap into to help make apply from: scripts work better, and there are a ton of low hanging fruit which can make this a lot more powerful.

If you'd like to help signal boost this new effort, here is the release tweet.