# Toolchain Resolver Plugins

version 8.14.4

In Gradle version 7.6 and above, Gradle provides a way to define Java toolchain auto-provisioning logic in plugins. This page explains how to author a toolchain resolver plugin. For details on how toolchain auto-provisioning interacts with these plugins, see Toolchains.

## Provide a download URI

Toolchain resolver plugins provide logic to map a toolchain request to a download response. At the moment the download response only contains a download URL, but may be extended in the future.

| For the download URL only secure protocols like `https` are accepted. This is required to make sure no one can tamper with the download in flight.

The plugins provide the mapping logic via an implementation of JavaToolchainResolver:

JavaToolchainResolverImplementation.java

    public abstract class JavaToolchainResolverImplementation
            implements JavaToolchainResolver { (1)

        public Optional<JavaToolchainDownload> resolve(JavaToolchainRequest request) { (2)
            return Optional.empty(); // custom mapping logic goes here instead
        }
    }

1 | This class is `abstract` because `JavaToolchainResolver` is a build service. Gradle provides dynamic implementations for certain abstract methods at runtime.
2 | The mapping method returns a download response wrapped in an `Optional`. If the resolver implementation can’t provide a matching toolchain, the enclosing `Optional` contains an empty value.

## Register the resolver in a plugin

Use a settings plugin (`Plugin<Settings>`) to register the `JavaToolchainResolver` implementation:

JavaToolchainResolverPlugin.java

    public abstract class JavaToolchainResolverPlugin implements Plugin<Settings> { (1)
        @Inject
        protected abstract JavaToolchainResolverRegistry getToolchainResolverRegistry(); (2)

        public void apply(Settings settings) {
            settings.getPluginManager().apply("jvm-toolchain-management"); (3)

            JavaToolchainResolverRegistry registry = getToolchainResolverRegistry();
            registry.register(JavaToolchainResolverImplementation.class);
        }
    }

1 | The plugin uses property injection, so it must be `abstract` and a settings plugin.
2 | To register the resolver implementation, use property injection to access the JavaToolchainResolverRegistry Gradle service.
3 | Resolver plugins must apply the `jvm-toolchain-management` base plugin. This dynamically adds the `jvm` block to `toolchainManagement`, which makes registered toolchain repositories usable from the build.