How to apply the com.android.application plugin using the new plugins DSL?

Question

I have a project configured through the triple of:

• Declare repository in top-level build.gradle:

  buildscript { repositories { google() }}
  allprojects { repositories { google() }}
  

• Declare classpath dependency, so plugin artifact gets downloaded from the appropriate repository, in top-level build.gradle

  buildscript { dependencies { classpath 'com.android.tools.build:gradle:3.1.3' }}
  

• Then, in the app build.gradle file, apply the plugin:

  apply plugin: 'com.android.application'
  

I want to migrate this to use the new plugins DSL as enabled by the PluginsDependenciesSpec.

I then:

• Declared the repository in settings.gradle:

  pluginManagement { repositories { google() }}
  

• Declared the plugin dependency in the app build.gradle:

  plugins { id "com.android.application" version "3.1.3" }
  

But this fails to resolve:

FAILURE: Build failed with an exception.

• Where: Build file '…/build.gradle' line: 2

• What went wrong: Plugin [id: 'com.android.application', version: '3.1.3'] was not found in any of the following sources:

• Gradle Core Plugins (plugin is not in 'org.gradle' namespace)

• Plugin Repositories (could not resolve plugin artifact 'com.android.library:com.android.library.gradle.plugin:3.1.3')

Searched in the following repositories:

• Google
• BintrayJCenter
• maven(https://maven.fabric.io/public)
• Gradle Central Plugin Repository

What am I missing to get Gradle to connect the dots here, so that it can connect the plugin.id to the appropriate JAR fetched from the appropriate repository?

Answer 1

Within the pluginManagement you can use resolutionStrategy and force usage of specific artifact from the google() repository.

pluginManagement {
    repositories {
        google()
    }

    resolutionStrategy {
        eachPlugin {
            if (requested.id.id in ['com.android.application', 'com.android.library']) {
                useModule("com.android.tools.build:gradle:${getProperty('version.plugin.android')}")
            }
        }
    }
}

Then you can apply android plugins with using new plugins DSL:

plugins {
    id 'com.android.application'
}

or

plugins {
    id 'com.android.library'
}

Here is the documentation.