Use gradle to upload jar to local Maven repository - maven

Question

This question has been asked several times, but somehow I don't get this to work. Gradle is a great tool, but its documentation is anything but great. No examples make it almost impossible to understand for someone who doesn't use it on a daily basis.
I am using Android Studio and I want to upload my module output jar to my local Maven repository.
apply plugin: 'java'
dependencies {
compile 'com.google.http-client:google-http-client-android:1.18.0-rc'
}
apply plugin: 'maven'
configure(install.repositories.mavenInstaller) {
pom.project {
groupId 'com.example'
artifactId 'example'
packaging 'jar'
}
}
When I start a build in Android Studio, I can see on the Gradle tab that
:install
is invoked. I also get a new jar in my build folder, but that jar is not uploaded to Maven. [The Maven repo exists and the Google appengine gradle plugin uploads its jar from another module of the same project just fine.]
What am I missing?

Answer 1

I suspect the problem is that you are only editing the POM (via pom.project), instead of configuring the actual Maven coordinates used for installation. Try the following instead:
// best way to set group ID
group = 'com.example'
install {
repositories.mavenInstaller {
// only necessary if artifact ID diverges from project name
// the latter defaults to project directory name and can be
// configured in settings.gradle
pom.artifactId = 'myName'
// shouldn't be needed as this is the default anyway
pom.packaging = 'jar'
}
}
PS: The samples directory in the full Gradle distribution contains many example builds, also for the maven plugin.

Answer 2

Peter N is CORRECT in the comments of the accepted answer, which works, but shouldn't be the accepted answer.
You should have this in your build.gradle file
apply plugin: "maven"
Then you can just do a
$ ./gradlew install
Or use the built-in task
$ ./gradlew publishToMavenLocal
Both methods install the artifacts in $HOME/.m2/com/example/example/version