# Update dependencies from within a custom task
**URL:** https://discuss.gradle.org/t/update-dependencies-from-within-a-custom-task/26075
**Category:** Help/Discuss
**Created:** [March 2, 2018, 9:41pm UTC](https://discuss.gradle.org/t/update-dependencies-from-within-a-custom-task/26075 "2018-03-02T21:41:39Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Norm](https://discuss.gradle.org/u/Norm)
#### Post date: [March 2, 2018, 9:41pm UTC](https://discuss.gradle.org/t/update-dependencies-from-within-a-custom-task/26075/1 "2018-03-02T21:41:40Z")
I hope this is an easy one. I have a custom task (written in Groovy) with options for the primary input and primary output files.
```
task myTask(type: MyCustomTask) {
input("primary", "somefile")
output("result", "someotherfile)
}
```
That’s fine, but of course I want Gradle to know about this dependency, so what I actually end up writing is
```
task myTask(type: MyCustomTask) {
inputs.file "somefile"
outputs.file "someotherfile"
input("primary", "somefile")
output("result", "someotherfile)
}
```
Which is annoying and redundant. Is there any way for the implementation of input() and output() to put their arguments into inputs and outputs automatically?
---
### Author:  [@Lance](https://discuss.gradle.org/u/Lance)
#### Post date: [March 2, 2018, 10:45pm UTC](https://discuss.gradle.org/t/update-dependencies-from-within-a-custom-task/26075/2 "2018-03-02T22:45:58Z")
Of course, the `input(...)` and `output(...)` methods are your custom methods, they can delegate through to `TaskInputs` and `TaskOutputs` methods in a similar way to `CopyTask.from(...)` or `CopyTask.into(...)` etc
---
### Author:  [@sterling](https://discuss.gradle.org/u/sterling)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2018, 6:02pm UTC](https://discuss.gradle.org/t/update-dependencies-from-within-a-custom-task/26075/3 "2018-03-03T18:02:40Z")
You can use annotations to mark properties of your task as inputs/outputs:
[https://guides.gradle.org/implementing-gradle-plugins/#benefiting\_from\_incremental\_tasks](https://guides.gradle.org/implementing-gradle-plugins/#benefiting_from_incremental_tasks)
---
### Author:  [@Lance](https://discuss.gradle.org/u/Lance)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2018, 11:05am UTC](https://discuss.gradle.org/t/update-dependencies-from-within-a-custom-task/26075/4 "2018-03-04T11:05:11Z")
Agreed, annotations are often less verbose than explicitly invoking TaskInputs/TaskOutputs methods