How to exclude generated files from gradle javadoc task?

Question

I am generating some code in my gradle build through a 3rd party plugin. The generated codes javadoc is malformed.

So i tried to exclude that path from gradles javadoc task but it does not work. I looked through similar questions but none offers a helpful answer.

$> ./gradlew --version
------------------------------------------------------------
Gradle 4.3
------------------------------------------------------------

Build time:   2017-10-30 15:43:29 UTC
Revision:     c684c202534c4138b51033b52d871939b8d38d72

Groovy:       2.4.12
Ant:          Apache Ant(TM) version 1.9.6 compiled on June 29 2015
JVM:          1.8.0_121 (Oracle Corporation 25.121-b13)
OS:           Windows 7 6.1 amd64

This is my build.gradle

sourceSets {
  main {
    compileClasspath += java.srcDir("${buildDir}/generated/src/main/com4j")
    runtimeClasspath += java.srcDir("${buildDir}/generated/src/main/com4j")
  }
  test {
    compileClasspath += java.srcDir("${buildDir}/generated/src/main/com4j")
    runtimeClasspath += java.srcDir("${buildDir}/generated/src/main/com4j")
  }
}

javadoc {
  exclude "**/generated/**"
  source = sourceSets.main.allJava
}

Has no effect.

$> ./gradlew javadoc
:javadocC:\cygwin64\home\username\sourcecode\COMJurer\build\generated\src\main\com4j\com\app\com4j\api\ClassFactory.java:15: warning: no @return
  public static com.app.com4j.api.IAPI createAPI() {
                                                     ^
C:\cygwin64\home\username\sourcecode\COMJurer\build\generated\src\main\com4j\com\app\com4j\api\IAPI.java:99: error: malformed HTML
   * @param xmlReturn Mandatory Holder<java.lang.String> parameter.
                                  ^
 C:\cygwin64\home\username\sourcecode\COMJurer\build\generated\src\main\com4j\com\app\com4j\api\IAPI.java:99: error: bad use of '>'
   * @param xmlReturn Mandatory Holder<java.lang.String> parameter.
                                                   ^

2 errors
1 warning
:javadoc FAILED

gradles documentation is lacking any specifics: https://docs.gradle.org/current/dsl/org.gradle.api.tasks.javadoc.Javadoc.html

Answer 1

The problem is that your pattern refers to the path of the source directory.

Javadoc patterns are matched against the package of the classes.

So you need instead to use a pattern that refers to the package(s) you need to exclude, something like:

exclude 'com/app/com4j/api/**'