My team likes to avoid downloading libraries , but we haven’t gotten around to hosting our own repository. For dependencies, I’ve found that I can just check-in the modules-2 directory, but the net.ltgt.apt plugin seems to be downloading every time. The jar is present in the cache, but it always downloads it. I’m using the new plugins closure to configure it if that makes a difference.
The modules-2 directory is internal detail and checking that in is guaranteed to break sooner or later. Also, as you discovered, without the metadata it would not work very well.
I’d say look into a proper artifact repo (i.e. Sonatype Nexus or JFrog’s Artifactory), or if you are really bent on checking in your repo with your sources, use a file-based ivy repository (check the manual and ask again if you can’t figure it out).
I’d like to cross that bridge when I come to it. I understand the pros/cons, but this is working for me right now. I will look into the file-based ivy repository if I have to, but I’d still like to know the “internal detail” of how to prevent downloading the apt plugin every time. It seems odd that it does it when the jar is already present.
For clarity here is someone with the same problem