Gradle is great build tool. Compared to Ant or Maven, it’s so much easier to use and write proper code for it — it’s unbelievable at times. A little while ago, I switched from an ugly Ant/Maven installation to Gradle with my open source project Syncany. Ever since then, I am simply amazed about what Gradle can do. Granted, it’s not always easy to understand and the lack of proper documentation and IDE support makes things more like a trial-and-error-based packaging experience. However, the amount of time that it saves is worth it.

Since I really like Gradle and I myself often have a hard time finding proper answers for the questions I have, I’d like to demonstrate a few solutions that I have come up with. In particular, I’ll describe how to create a Windows installer using Inno Setup under Linux, create Debian packages and manage a PPA (debuild/dput) as well as how to add an optional Gradle sub-project.

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