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Policy on AI-Assisted Contributions to the Gradle Build Tool

We use AI tools daily and welcome AI-assisted contributions—provided the human behind them meets the standards below.

Why this policy exists

There is a fundamental asymmetry between submitting a contribution and reviewing one: AI tools make it easy to generate and submit large amounts of code, but they do not make it equally faster for us to review it. This policy protects our limited review budget, allowing us to invest our attention wisely.

A pull request is not a finished product—it is the start of a conversation, and an implied contract: we promise to provide thoughtful feedback, and we expect the contributor to engage with us in return.

What we expect from contributors

  1. Understand the content you submit, PRs as well as issues, and be able to explain it. Our goal is for humans to use AI tools intentionally and with full control, rather than merely serving as proxies for AI agents. If you cannot explain the reason for something, we will assume you do not understand it, and the PR or issue will likely be closed.
  2. Disclose significant AI involvement. If AI tools played a major role in producing your contribution, say so in the pull request description or a top-level PR comment. We are not interested in incidental use, such as asking a chatbot for advice or accepting an autocomplete suggestion—but rather in cases where a tool generated substantial portions of the work. Disclosure will not reduce the likelihood of your PR or issue being accepted; we ask because information about AI tool use helps us evaluate their impact, build new best practices, and adjust existing processes. Disclosure belongs in the PR conversation, not in the commit history. Do not add AI tools as commit co-authors (for example, Co-authored-by: Claude <...> or similar trailers for Copilot, Cursor, or other assistants). Commit metadata—including the DCO Signed-off-by line—is a human attestation. AI tools are your instruments, not your collaborators, and they cannot sign the Developer Certificate of Origin.
  3. Actively collaborate with us. We commit real time and attention to everything we review. Low-effort submissions—where code is generated, submitted, and abandoned—waste our limited review capacity.

What contributors can expect from us

  1. Human review, human decisions. A real human developer will review your PR, provide feedback, and decide whether to accept or reject it. We may use AI tools to help us understand your changes, but a human is always in charge.
  2. Thoughtful, honest feedback. We will consider every contribution on its merits, regardless of whether AI was used. We may not respond quickly—our review queue is long—but we will tell you clearly what works, what needs to change, and why.
  3. A relationship, not a transaction. We view community PRs as an important part of our relationship with the Gradle community. We hope contributors will learn from the review process, stay engaged, and continue helping us build Gradle.

In summary

We welcome AI-assisted contributions from people who understand what they're submitting and are ready to collaborate on it.

We reserve the right to close PRs and restrict future contributions from submitters who repeatedly violate this policy, submit low-effort AI-generated content, or fail to engage meaningfully in the review process. The value of a contribution is not only in the code it delivers, but in the knowledge shared and the community relationships built along the way.