Chapter 71. Building Play applications

Table of Contents

71.1. Usage
71.2. Limitations
71.3. Software Model
71.4. Project Layout
71.5. Tasks
71.6. Finding out more about your project
71.7. Running a Play application
71.8. Configuring a Play application
71.9. Multi-project Play applications
71.10. Packaging a Play application for distribution
71.11. Building a Play application with an IDE
71.12. Resources

Support for building Play applications is currently incubating. Please be aware that the DSL, APIs and other configuration may change in later Gradle versions.

Play is a modern web application framework. The Play plugin adds support for building, testing and running Play applications with Gradle.

The Play plugin makes use of the Gradle software model.

71.1. Usage

To use the Play plugin, include the following in your build script to apply the play plugin and add the Typesafe repositories:

Example 71.1. Using the Play plugin

build.gradle

plugins {
    id 'play'
}

repositories {
    jcenter()
    maven {
        name "typesafe-maven-release"
        url "https://repo.typesafe.com/typesafe/maven-releases"
    }
    ivy {
        name "typesafe-ivy-release"
        url "https://repo.typesafe.com/typesafe/ivy-releases"
        layout "ivy"
    }
}

Note that defining the Typesafe repositories is necessary. In future versions of Gradle, this will be replaced with a more convenient syntax.

71.2. Limitations

The Play plugin currently has a few limitations.

  • Full support is limited to Play 2.3.x applications. Limited support is available for Play 2.4.x applications. Gradle does not include support for a few new build-related features in 2.4. Specifically, Gradle does not yet support aggregate reverse routes. Future Gradle versions will add more support for Play 2.5.x and 2.6.x.

  • A given project may only define a single Play application. This means that a single project cannot build more than one Play application. However, a multi-project build can have many projects that each define their own Play application.

  • Play applications can only target a single “platform” (combination of Play, Scala and Java version) at a time. This means that it is currently not possible to define multiple variants of a Play application that, for example, produce jars for both Scala 2.10 and 2.11. This limitation may be lifted in future Gradle versions.

  • Support for generating IDE configurations for Play applications is limited to IDEA.

71.3. Software Model

The Play plugin uses a software model to describe a Play application and how to build it. The Play software model extends the base Gradle software model to add support for building Play applications. A Play application is represented by a PlayApplicationSpec component type. The plugin automatically creates a single PlayApplicationBinarySpec instance when it is applied. Additional Play components cannot be added to a project.

Figure 71.1. Play plugin - software model

Play plugin - software model

71.3.1. The Play application component

A Play application component describes the application to be built and consists of several configuration elements. One type of element that describes the application are the source sets that define where the application controller, route, template and model class source files should be found. These source sets are logical groupings of files of a particular type and a default source set for each type is created when the play plugin is applied.

Table 71.1. Default Play source sets

Source Set Type Directory Filters
java JavaSourceSet app **/*.java
scala ScalaLanguageSourceSet app **/*.scala
routes RoutesSourceSet conf routes, *.routes
twirlTemplates TwirlSourceSet app **/*.html
javaScript JavaScriptSourceSet app/assets **/*.js

These source sets can be configured or additional source sets can be added to the Play component. See Configuring Play for further information.

Another element of configuring a Play application is the platform. To build a Play application, Gradle needs to understand which versions of Play, Scala and Java to use. The Play component specifies this requirement as a PlayPlatform. If these values are not configured, a default version of Play, Scala and Java will be used. See Targeting a certain version of Play for information on configuring the Play platform.

Note that only a single platform can be specified for a given Play component. This means that only a single version of Play, Scala and Java can be used to build a Play component. In other words, a Play component can only produce one set of outputs, and those outputs will be built using the versions specified by the platform configured on the component.

71.3.2. The Play application binary

A Play application component is compiled and packaged to produce a set of outputs which are represented by a PlayApplicationBinarySpec. The Play binary specifies the jar files produced by building the component as well as providing elements by which additional content can be added to those jar files. It also exposes the tasks involved in building the component and creating the binary.

See Configuring Play for examples of configuring the Play binary.

71.4. Project Layout

The Play plugin follows the typical Play application layout. You can configure source sets to include additional directories or change the defaults.

├── app                 → Application source code.
│   ├── assets          → Assets that require compilation.
│   │   └── javascripts → JavaScript source code to be minified.
│   ├── controllers     → Application controller source code.
│   ├── models          → Application business source code.
│   └── views           → Application UI templates.
├── build.gradle        → Your project's build script.
├── conf                → Main application configuration file and routes files.
├── public              → Public assets.
│   ├── images          → Application image files.
│   ├── javascripts     → Typically JavaScript source code.
│   └── stylesheets     → Typically CSS source code.
└── test                → Test source code.

71.5. Tasks

The Play plugin hooks into the normal Gradle lifecycle tasks such as assemble, check and build, but it also adds several additional tasks which form the lifecycle of a Play project:

Table 71.2. Play plugin - lifecycle tasks

Task name Depends on Type Description
playBinary All compile tasks for source sets added to the Play application. Task Performs a build of just the Play application.
dist createPlayBinaryZipDist, createPlayBinaryTarDist Task Assembles the Play distribution.
stage stagePlayBinaryDist Task Stages the Play distribution.

The plugin also provides tasks for running, testing and packaging your Play application:

Table 71.3. Play plugin - running and testing tasks

Task name Depends on Type Description
runPlayBinary playBinary to build Play application. PlayRun Runs the Play application for local development. See how this works with continuous build.
testPlayBinary playBinary to build Play application and compilePlayBinaryTests. Test Runs JUnit/TestNG tests for the Play application.

For the different types of sources in a Play application, the plugin adds the following compilation tasks:

Table 71.4. Play plugin - source set tasks

Task name Source Type Type Description
compilePlayBinaryScala Scala and Java PlatformScalaCompile Compiles all Scala and Java sources defined by the Play application.
compilePlayBinaryPlayTwirlTemplates Twirl HTML templates TwirlCompile Compiles HTML templates with the Twirl compiler.
compilePlayBinaryPlayRoutes Play Route files RoutesCompile Compiles routes files into Scala sources.
minifyPlayBinaryJavaScript JavaScript files JavaScriptMinify Minifies JavaScript files with the Google Closure compiler.

71.6. Finding out more about your project

Gradle provides a report that you can run from the command-line that shows some details about the components and binaries that your project produces. To use this report, just run gradle components. Below is an example of running this report for one of the sample projects:

Example 71.2. The components report

Output of gradle components

> gradle components
:components

------------------------------------------------------------
Root project
------------------------------------------------------------

Play Application 'play'
-----------------------

Source sets
    Java source 'play:java'
        srcDir: app
        includes: **/*.java
    JavaScript source 'play:javaScript'
        srcDir: app/assets
        includes: **/*.js
    JVM resources 'play:resources'
        srcDir: conf
    Routes source 'play:routes'
        srcDir: conf
        includes: routes, *.routes
    Scala source 'play:scala'
        srcDir: app
        includes: **/*.scala
    Twirl template source 'play:twirlTemplates'
        srcDir: app
        includes: **/*.html

Binaries
    Play Application Jar 'play:binary'
        build using task: :playBinary
        target platform: Play Platform (Play 2.3.9, Scala: 2.11, Java: Java SE 8)
        toolchain: Default Play Toolchain
        classes dir: build/playBinary/classes
        resources dir: build/playBinary/resources
        JAR file: build/playBinary/lib/basic.jar

Note: currently not all plugins register their components, so some components may not be visible here.

BUILD SUCCESSFUL

Total time: 1 secs

71.7. Running a Play application

The runPlayBinary task starts the Play application under development. During development it is beneficial to execute this task as a continuous build. Continuous build is a generic feature that supports automatically re-running a build when inputs change. The runPlayBinary task is “continuous build aware” in that it behaves differently when run as part of a continuous build.

When not run as part of a continuous build, the runPlayBinary task will block the build. That is, the task will not complete as long as the application is running. When running as part of a continuous build, the task will start the application if not running and otherwise propagate any changes to the code of the application to the running instance. This is useful for quickly iterating on your Play application with an edit->rebuild->refresh cycle. Changes to your application will not take affect until the end of the overall build.

To enable continuous build, run Gradle with -t runPlayBinary or --continuous runPlayBinary.

Users of Play used to such a workflow with Play's default build system should note that compile errors are handled differently. If a build failure occurs during a continuous build, the Play application will not be reloaded. Instead, you will be presented with an exception message. The exception message will only contain the overall cause of the build failure. More detailed information will only be available from the console.

71.8. Configuring a Play application

71.8.1. Targeting a certain version of Play

By default, Gradle uses Play 2.3.9, Scala 2.11 and the version of Java used to start the build. A Play application can select a different version by specifying a target PlayApplicationSpec.platform(java.lang.Object) on the Play application component.

Example 71.3. Selecting a version of the Play Framework

build.gradle

model {
    components {
        play {
            platform play: '2.3.6', scala: '2.10'
        }
    }
}

71.8.2. Adding dependencies

You can add compile, test and runtime dependencies to a Play application through Configuration created by the Play plugin.

If you are coming from SBT, the Play SBT plugin provides short names for common dependencies. For instance, if your project has a dependency on ws, you will need to add a dependency to com.typesafe.play:play-ws_2.11:2.3.9 where 2.11 is your Scala version and 2.3.9 is your Play framework version.

Other dependencies that have short names, such as jacksons may actually be multiple dependencies. For those dependencies, you will need to work out the dependency coordinates from a dependency report.

  • play is used for compile time dependencies.

  • playTest is used for test compile time dependencies.

  • playRun is used for run time dependencies.

Example 71.4. Adding dependencies to a Play application

build.gradle

dependencies {
    play "commons-lang:commons-lang:2.6"
}

71.8.3. Configuring the default source sets

You can further configure the default source sets to do things like add new directories, add filters, etc.

71.8.4. Adding extra source sets

If your Play application has additional sources that exist in non-standard directories, you can add extra source sets that Gradle will automatically add to the appropriate compile tasks.

Example 71.5. Adding extra source sets to a Play application

build.gradle

model {
    components {
        play {
            sources {
                java {
                    source.srcDir "additional/java"
                }
                javaScript {
                    source {
                        srcDir "additional/javascript"
                        exclude "**/old_*.js"
                    }
                }
            }
        }
    }
}

build.gradle

model {
    components {
        play {
            sources {
                extraJava(JavaSourceSet) {
                    source.srcDir "extra/java"
                }
                extraTwirl(TwirlSourceSet) {
                    source.srcDir "extra/twirl"
                }
                extraRoutes(RoutesSourceSet) {
                    source.srcDir "extra/routes"
                }
            }
        }
    }
}

71.8.5. Configuring compiler options

If your Play application requires additional Scala compiler flags, you can add these arguments directly to the Scala compiler task.

Example 71.6. Configuring Scala compiler options

build.gradle

model {
    components {
        play {
            binaries.all {
                tasks.withType(PlatformScalaCompile) {
                    scalaCompileOptions.additionalParameters = ["-feature", "-language:implicitConversions"]
                }
            }
        }
    }
}

71.8.6. Configuring routes style

The injected router is only supported in Play Framework 2.4 or better.

If your Play application's router uses dependency injection to access your controllers, you'll need to configure your application to not use the default static router. Under the covers, the Play plugin is using the InjectedRoutesGenerator instead of the default StaticRoutesGenerator to generate the router classes.

Example 71.7. Configuring routes style

build.gradle

model {
    components {
        play {
            injectedRoutesGenerator = true
        }
    }
}

71.8.7. Injecting a custom asset pipeline

Gradle Play support comes with a simplistic asset processing pipeline that minifies JavaScript assets. However, many organizations have their own custom pipeline for processing assets. You can easily hook the results of your pipeline into the Play binary by utilizing the PublicAssets property on the binary.

Example 71.8. Configuring a custom asset pipeline

build.gradle

model {
    components {
        play {
            binaries.all { binary ->
                tasks.create("addCopyrightToPlay${binary.name.capitalize()}Assets", AddCopyrights) { copyrightTask ->
                    source "raw-assets"
                    copyrightFile = project.file('copyright.txt')
                    destinationDir = project.file("${buildDir}/play${binary.name.capitalize()}/addCopyRights")

                    // Hook this task into the binary
                    binary.assets.addAssetDir destinationDir
                    binary.assets.builtBy copyrightTask
                }
            }
        }
    }
}

class AddCopyrights extends SourceTask {
    @InputFile
    File copyrightFile

    @OutputDirectory
    File destinationDir

    @TaskAction
    void generateAssets() {
        String copyright = copyrightFile.text
        getSource().files.each { File file ->
            File outputFile = new File(destinationDir, file.name)
            outputFile.text = "${copyright}\n${file.text}"
        }
    }
}

71.9. Multi-project Play applications

Play applications can be built in multi-project builds as well. Simply apply the play plugin in the appropriate subprojects and create any project dependencies on the play configuration.

Example 71.9. Configuring dependencies on Play subprojects

build.gradle

dependencies {
    play project(":admin")
    play project(":user")
    play project(":util")
}

See the play/multiproject sample provided in the Gradle distribution for a working example.

71.10. Packaging a Play application for distribution

Gradle provides the capability to package your Play application so that it can easily be distributed and run in a target environment. The distribution package (zip file) contains the Play binary jars, all dependencies, and generated scripts that set up the classpath and run the application in a Play-specific Netty container.

The distribution can be created by running the dist lifecycle task and places the distribution in the $buildDir/distributions directory. Alternatively, one can validate the contents by running the stage lifecycle task which copies the files to the $buildDir/stage directory using the layout of the distribution package.

Table 71.5. Play distribution tasks

Task name Depends on Type Description
createPlayBinaryStartScripts - CreateStartScripts Generates scripts to run the Play application distribution.
stagePlayBinaryDist playBinary, createPlayBinaryStartScripts Copy Copies all jar files, dependencies and scripts into a staging directory.
createPlayBinaryZipDist Zip Bundles the Play application as a standalone distribution packaged as a zip.
createPlayBinaryTarDist Tar Bundles the Play application as a standalone distribution packaged as a tar.
stage stagePlayBinaryDist Task Lifecycle task for staging a Play distribution.
dist createPlayBinaryZipDist, createPlayBinaryTarDist Task Lifecycle task for creating a Play distribution.

71.10.1. Adding additional files to your Play application distribution

You can add additional files to the distribution package using the Distribution API.

Example 71.10. Add extra files to a Play application distribution

build.gradle

model {
    distributions {
        playBinary {
            contents {
                from("README.md")
                from("scripts") {
                    into "bin"
                }
            }
        }
    }
}

71.11. Building a Play application with an IDE

If you want to generate IDE metadata configuration for your Play project, you need to apply the appropriate IDE plugin. Gradle supports generating IDE metadata for IDEA only for Play projects at this time.

To generate IDEA's metadata, apply the idea plugin along with the play plugin.

Example 71.11. Applying both the Play and IDEA plugins

build.gradle

plugins {
    id 'play'
    id 'idea'
}

Source code generated by routes and Twirl templates cannot be generated by IDEA directly, so changes made to those files will not affect compilation until the next Gradle build. You can run the Play application with Gradle in continuous build to automatically rebuild and reload the application whenever something changes.

71.12. Resources

For additional information about developing Play applications: