Why does Gradle need a settings.gradle file?

Question

I am going to convert my Android projects from Ant to Gradle.

My Eclipse workspace is very simple:

Workspace
     MyApp
     MyApp-AndroidLibrary
         


        

Answer 1

You are asking several different questions. Here are some hints:

• ':MyApp-AndroidLibrary' is a logical project path, which gets mapped to a physical path based on information provided in settings.gradle.
• A multi-project build can have an arbitrary directory structure, which is configured in settings.gradle. No need to move directories around, unless you want to.
• Eclipse workspace and Gradle build are separate boundaries. You can have multiple builds in the same workspace.
• When working with libraries built from source, you can either make them part of the same build, or have a separate build for them. In the latter case, you need to make sure to build the library before the app, and exchange artifacts via a Maven or Ivy repository. This could be automated using a CI server and a corporate Maven/Ivy repository. Alternatively, you could trigger the library's build manually on your machine and use a local Maven/Ivy repository.

For more information, check out the Gradle User Guide, especially the chapter on multi-project builds.