diff --git a/core/src/main/java/com/microsoft/applicationinsights/internal/channel/samplingV2/FixedRateSamplingTelemetryProcessor.java b/core/src/main/java/com/microsoft/applicationinsights/internal/channel/samplingV2/FixedRateSamplingTelemetryProcessor.java
index 9b556860df9..0e293672515 100644
--- a/core/src/main/java/com/microsoft/applicationinsights/internal/channel/samplingV2/FixedRateSamplingTelemetryProcessor.java
+++ b/core/src/main/java/com/microsoft/applicationinsights/internal/channel/samplingV2/FixedRateSamplingTelemetryProcessor.java
@@ -1,6 +1,5 @@
 package com.microsoft.applicationinsights.internal.channel.samplingV2;
 
-import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.agent.internal.common.StringUtils;
 import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.extensibility.TelemetryProcessor;
 import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.internal.annotation.BuiltInProcessor;
 import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.internal.logger.InternalLogger;
@@ -12,6 +11,8 @@
 import java.util.Map;
 import java.util.Set;
 
+import org.apache.commons.lang3.StringUtils;
+
 /**
  * This processor is used to Perform Sampling on User specified sampling rate
  * <p>
@@ -99,9 +100,9 @@ public Set<Class> getIncludedTypes() {
 
     private void setIncludedOrExcludedTypes(String value, Set<Class> typeSet) {
 
-        if (!StringUtils.isNullOrEmpty(value)) {
+        if (!StringUtils.isEmpty(value)) {
             value = value.trim();
-            if (!StringUtils.isNullOrEmpty(value) && allowedTypes.containsKey(value)) {
+            if (!StringUtils.isEmpty(value) && allowedTypes.containsKey(value)) {
                 typeSet.add(allowedTypes.get(value));
             } else {
                 InternalLogger.INSTANCE.error("Item is either not allowed to sample or is empty");
diff --git a/core/src/main/java/com/microsoft/applicationinsights/internal/channel/samplingV2/SamplingScoreGeneratorV2.java b/core/src/main/java/com/microsoft/applicationinsights/internal/channel/samplingV2/SamplingScoreGeneratorV2.java
index 11c4be0d1b5..7f9b35e065c 100644
--- a/core/src/main/java/com/microsoft/applicationinsights/internal/channel/samplingV2/SamplingScoreGeneratorV2.java
+++ b/core/src/main/java/com/microsoft/applicationinsights/internal/channel/samplingV2/SamplingScoreGeneratorV2.java
@@ -1,9 +1,9 @@
 package com.microsoft.applicationinsights.internal.channel.samplingV2;
 
-import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.agent.internal.common.StringUtils;
 import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.telemetry.Telemetry;
 
 import java.util.Random;
+import org.apache.commons.lang3.StringUtils;
 
 /**
  * Created by Dhaval Doshi Oct 2017
@@ -24,7 +24,7 @@ public static double getSamplingScore(Telemetry telemetry) {
 
         double samplingScore = 0.0;
 
-        if (!StringUtils.isNullOrEmpty(telemetry.getContext().getOperation().getId())) {
+        if (!StringUtils.isEmpty(telemetry.getContext().getOperation().getId())) {
             samplingScore =  ((double) getSamplingHashCode(telemetry.getContext().getOperation().getId()) / Integer.MAX_VALUE);
         }
 
@@ -37,7 +37,7 @@ public static double getSamplingScore(Telemetry telemetry) {
     }
 
      static int getSamplingHashCode(String input) {
-        if (StringUtils.isNullOrEmpty(input)) {
+        if (StringUtils.isEmpty(input)) {
             return 0;
         }
 
diff --git a/core/src/test/java/com/microsoft/applicationinsights/internal/channel/samplingV2/FixedRateSamplingTelemetryProcessorTest.java b/core/src/test/java/com/microsoft/applicationinsights/internal/channel/samplingV2/FixedRateSamplingTelemetryProcessorTest.java
index da96d3720e9..dce24521527 100644
--- a/core/src/test/java/com/microsoft/applicationinsights/internal/channel/samplingV2/FixedRateSamplingTelemetryProcessorTest.java
+++ b/core/src/test/java/com/microsoft/applicationinsights/internal/channel/samplingV2/FixedRateSamplingTelemetryProcessorTest.java
@@ -3,13 +3,13 @@
 import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.TelemetryClient;
 import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.TelemetryConfiguration;
 import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.TestFramework.StubTelemetryChannel;
-import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.agent.internal.common.StringUtils;
 import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.extensibility.TelemetryProcessor;
 import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.telemetry.PageViewTelemetry;
 import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.telemetry.RemoteDependencyTelemetry;
 import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.telemetry.RequestTelemetry;
 import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.telemetry.SupportSampling;
 import com.microsoft.applicationinsights.telemetry.Telemetry;
+import org.apache.commons.lang3.StringUtils;
 import org.junit.Assert;
 import org.junit.Test;
 
@@ -513,7 +513,7 @@ private void testSampling(TelemetryClient client , List<List<Telemetry>> depende
         processor.setSamplingPercentage(String.valueOf(samplingRate));
         if (includeTypes != null) {
             for (String includeType : includeTypes) {
-                if (!StringUtils.isNullOrEmpty(includeType)) {
+                if (!StringUtils.isEmpty(includeType)) {
                     processor.addToIncludedType(includeType);
                 }
             }
@@ -521,7 +521,7 @@ private void testSampling(TelemetryClient client , List<List<Telemetry>> depende
 
         if (excludeTypes != null) {
             for (String excludeType : excludeTypes) {
-                if (!StringUtils.isNullOrEmpty(excludeType)) {
+                if (!StringUtils.isEmpty(excludeType)) {
                     processor.addToExcludedType(excludeType);
                 }
             }
@@ -559,7 +559,7 @@ private void testNoSampling(TelemetryClient client , List<List<Telemetry>> depen
         processor.setSamplingPercentage(String.valueOf(samplingRate));
         if (includeTypes != null) {
             for (String includeType : includeTypes) {
-                if (!StringUtils.isNullOrEmpty(includeType)) {
+                if (!StringUtils.isEmpty(includeType)) {
                     processor.addToIncludedType(includeType);
                 }
             }
@@ -567,7 +567,7 @@ private void testNoSampling(TelemetryClient client , List<List<Telemetry>> depen
 
         if (excludeTypes != null) {
             for (String excludeType : excludeTypes) {
-                if (!StringUtils.isNullOrEmpty(excludeType)) {
+                if (!StringUtils.isEmpty(excludeType)) {
                     processor.addToExcludedType(excludeType);
                 }
             }
diff --git a/gradle/provided-configuration.gradle b/gradle/provided-configuration.gradle
index 4aa7fe351b7..a87e81bc3e8 100644
--- a/gradle/provided-configuration.gradle
+++ b/gradle/provided-configuration.gradle
@@ -19,21 +19,18 @@
  * DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.
  */
 
-// Adding the "provided" configuration
-
-ext {
-    PROVIDED_CONFIGURATION_NAME = "provided"
+// Defines the "provided" configuration for dependencies that the client is responsible for including on the classpath
+configurations {
+    provided
 }
 
-configurations {
-    provided {
-        // Remove the provided dependencies from the default configuration so
-        // these dependencies won't be derived by projects that has a dependency on
-        // the project using the provided scope
-        dependencies.all { dep ->
-            configurations.default.exclude group: dep.group, module: dep.name
-        }
+sourceSets {
+    main {
+        compileClasspath += configurations.provided
+        runtimeClasspath += configurations.provided
+    }
+    test {
+        compileClasspath += configurations.provided
+        runtimeClasspath += configurations.provided
     }
-    compile.extendsFrom provided
 }
-