Question

I’m using Gradle’s concept of SourceSets as a way to declare JavaScript sources, however, I can’t quite figure out a way to allow sources to be declared in a given order. What I want is something like:

javascript.source {
    custom {
        js {
            srcDir "src/js"
            include "file2.js", "file1.js"
        }
    }
}

to give a collection of files in the order I declared.

I know that I can do this with a FileTree, but I feel like there’s something I’m missing to make this work with declaring SourceSets.

If this isn’t possible, what should I use for ordered sources?

EDIT: Note that I need order-dependence because I’m working with JavaScript.

Answer 1

I can suggest you to try declaring a second sourceSet containing file1.js and making your original sourceSet depend on it. So roughly:

javascript.source {
    custom2 {
        js {
            srcDir "src/js2"
            include "file2.js"
        }
    }
    custom {
        js {
            srcDir "src/js"
            include "file1.js"
        }
        compileClasspath += custom2.outputs
    }
}

Not sure if this is possible with the plugin that you are using, though. But hope you get the idea.

I guess in a declarative system like Gradle, the only way to specify order is though declaring dependencies between the different parts, and letting Gradle work-out the order for you.