Problem with PMD plugin in Gradle

[mariometushev]

Hi guys, I have a question.

Gradle version: 7.4
PMD version: 6.45.0

In my project I’m using pmd plugin.
As you already know by default gradle includes one file with rules, this file is category/java/errorprone.xml.

If you want to remove this file, you must clear ruleSets property:
ruleSets = [ ] and then provide your custom one using ruleSetFiles,
unfortunately this doesn’t work as I expected.
Somehow I still receive rules defined in category/java/errorprone.xml, but not in my custom file.

I define the rules by following the pmd docs, for example:

<rule ref="category/java/errorprone.xml/CloneMethodMustBePublic"/>
<rule ref="category/java/errorprone.xml/CloneMethodReturnTypeMustMatchClassName"/>
<rule ref="category/java/errorprone.xml/ProperCloneImplementation"/>
<rule ref="category/java/errorprone.xml/CloneThrowsCloneNotSupportedException"/>

Can someone explain what is happening :)

[adangel]

By the way, this should be easier with gradle 8. They improved the configuration (see gradle/gradle#22211)

According to the current documentation https://docs.gradle.org/current/dsl/org.gradle.api.plugins.quality.Pmd.html#org.gradle.api.plugins.quality.Pmd there seems to be a third parameter called ruleSetConfig. Maybe setting ruleSets = [] and using ruleSetConfig instead of ruleSetFiles helps?

I tried it out myself and it works as it should - only the custom ruleset is used:

plugins {
    id 'pmd'
}

pmd {
    consoleOutput = true
    toolVersion = "6.45.0"
    ruleSets = []
    ruleSetFiles = files("${project.rootDir}/custom-ruleset.xml")
}

complete ruleset custom-ruleset.xml

<ruleset name="Custom ruleset for tests"
    xmlns="http://pmd.sourceforge.net/ruleset/2.0.0"
    xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
    xsi:schemaLocation="http://pmd.sourceforge.net/ruleset/2.0.0 http://pmd.sourceforge.net/ruleset_2_0_0.xsd">
  <description>Custom ruleset for tests</description>

    <rule ref="category/java/errorprone.xml/CloneMethodMustBePublic"/>
    <rule ref="category/java/errorprone.xml/CloneMethodReturnTypeMustMatchClassName"/>
    <rule ref="category/java/errorprone.xml/ProperCloneImplementation"/>
    <rule ref="category/java/errorprone.xml/CloneThrowsCloneNotSupportedException"/>

</ruleset>

Somehow I still receive rules defined in category/java/errorprone.xml, but not in my custom file.

What error/message do you get? Note, that you use rules from errorprone in your custom ruleset, so e.g. you should expect "CloneMethodMustBePublic" but not other rules from errorprone (such as AssignmentInOperand).

[mariometushev]

Hi @adangel, thank you for your reply.
Actually, your example of the ruleSetFiles property solves the problem.
You are using ${project.rootDir}, I don't know why but on my end I am using rootDir.canonicalPath and that breaks the logic.

Thank you again, have a nice day :)