Error on initializing Spring boot project with Gradle: java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: groovy/lang/GroovyObject

Question

Environment:

STS 4.8.1

JDK 17

Gradle 8.5

Windows 10

I am facing following error message when I try to create a Spring Boot project in the Eclipse(+Spring Tools) IDE with Gradle as the build system:

Could not run phased build action using connection to Gradle distribution 'https://services.gradle.org/distributions/gradle-8.5-bin.zip'. groovy/lang/GroovyObject groovy.lang.GroovyObject cannot be found by ch.qos.logback.classic_1.2.3.v20200428-2012

Answer 1

First I thought it was compatibility problem between the Gradle version and the JDK I'm using. I double checked and confirmed compatibility in this page: https://docs.gradle.org/current/userguide/compatibility.html

Then I figured out that the root of problem is incompatibility with the Groovy provided by Buildship gradle plugin(v3.1.7) installed in my Eclipse IDE(4.8.1). I tried to update Buildship to the latest version 3.1.8(at time of this writing) but the update was failing.

Finally the problem got resolved by installing the latest version of Eclipse IDE(v4.21) that came with Buildship Gradle plugin v3.1.8 already installed in it.

After IDE update I had to import the new project in to workspace of the newly installed IDE.