What Is The Current Path In A Gradle Multi-Module Project? - gradle

Question

I have a multi-module project that ends up outputting a directory called logs at the root of each module - including the root project.
I have extended the clean task like this but it only deletes the logs dir in the root project and not in the sub-modules.
allprojects {
clean {
delete 'logs'
}
}
I thought that this meant "add the clean task to all the projects and delete the logs dir in each project".
It seems like even though the delete is being called in each sub-module, it is using the root directory as the relative path to find the logs dir.
However, if I change it to the following it deletes the directory in each module.
allprojects {
clean {
delete file('./logs')
}
}
This looks functionally identical to me since if the path of each clean task is relative to the root then file('./logs') should also be relative to the root.
However, the file object seems to be relative to the module dir and not the root.
Why does the file object resolve correctly but the string passed to the clean task does not?
How are paths resolved for each module when running a multi-module project?
Is there a better way to do this than using a file object?

Answer 1

Could not replicate - gradle 6.7 / jdk 11
Dir structure
.
|____a
| |____b
| |____c
common delete task
allprojects {
apply plugin: 'java'
task deleteLogs(type: Delete) {
delete 'logs'
}
clean {
delete 'logs'
}
task printcd {
println 'project : ' + project.name
println 'rootDir : ' + project.rootDir
println 'prjDir : ' + project.projectDir
println '-------------'
println 'file : ' + file('logs').absolutePath
println 'file ./ : ' + file('./logs').absolutePath
println '-------------'
print 'deletePath : '
project.tasks.getByName('deleteLogs').targetFiles.each {file -> println file.absolutePath }
println '-------------'
print 'clean : '
project.tasks.getByName('clean').targetFiles.each {file -> print file.absolutePath + " , " }
println ''
println '============='
}
repositories {
mavenCentral()
}
}
output
-bash$ gradle printcd
> Configure project :
project : a
rootDir : /Users/xyz/a
prjDir : /Users/xyz/a
-------------
file : /Users/xyz/a/logs
file ./ : /Users/xyz/a/logs
-------------
deletePath : /Users/xyz/a/logs
-------------
clean : /Users/xyz/a/build , /Users/xyz/a/logs ,
=============
project : b
rootDir : /Users/xyz/a
prjDir : /Users/xyz/a/b
-------------
file : /Users/xyz/a/b/logs
file ./ : /Users/xyz/a/b/logs
-------------
deletePath : /Users/xyz/a/b/logs
-------------
clean : /Users/xyz/a/b/build , /Users/xyz/a/b/logs ,
=============
project : c
rootDir : /Users/xyz/a
prjDir : /Users/xyz/a/c
-------------
file : /Users/xyz/a/c/logs
file ./ : /Users/xyz/a/c/logs
-------------
deletePath : /Users/xyz/a/c/logs
-------------
clean : /Users/xyz/a/c/build , /Users/xyz/a/c/logs ,
=============
BUILD SUCCESSFUL in 578ms
-bash$ gradle --version
------------------------------------------------------------
Gradle 6.7
------------------------------------------------------------
JVM: 11.0.8 (Oracle Corporation 11.0.8+10-LTS)