Cleanest way in Gradle to get the path to a jar file in the gradle dependency cache

Your code can be simplified a bit, for example project.configurations.compile.find { it.name.startsWith("solr-solrj-") }.

You can also create a dedicated configuration for an artifact, to keep it clean; and use asPath if the fact that it can potentially return several locations works well for your use case (happens if it resolves same jar in several locations):

configurations {  solr}dependencies {  solr 'org.apache.solr:solr-solrj:3.5.0'}task findSolrJars() {  println configurations.solr.asPath}

To avoid copy-paste, in case you as well need that jar in compile configuration, you may add this dedicated configuration into compile one, like:

dependencies {  solr 'org.apache.solr:solr-solrj:3.5.0'  compile configurations.solr.dependencies}

I needed lombok.jar as a java build flag to gwt builds this worked great !

configurations {  lombok}dependencies {  lombok 'org.projectlombok:lombok+'} ext {   lombok = configurations.lombok.asPath}compileGwt {  jvmArgs "-javaagent:${lombok}=ECJ"}

I was surprised that the resolution worked early enough in the configuraiton phase, but it does.