gradle doesn't work in Intellij - problems with JAVA_HOME - intellij-idea

Question

I can run gradle from a command line to see its version.
I can run, compile and debug a grails app in IntelliJ (version 10.0 or version 10.2)
I installed the IntelliJ Gradle Plugin.
Whenever I try to do anything with gradle from within Intellij I get an error as follows:
Executing command: "tasks"
Failed to connect to gradle process for command 'tasks'
ERROR: JAVA_HOME is set to an invalid directory: C:\Program Files (x86)\JetBrains\IntelliJ IDEA 10.0\jre
Please set the JAVA_HOME variable in your environment to match the
location of your Java installation.
But in my environment I have JAVA_HOME set to the proper JDK in a different directory. Plus when I look in IntelliJ for the project, it also shows the JDK in the proper JDK location. I cannot find anything that attempts to point the JDK to the Intellij JRE location.
Any ideas please?

Answer 1

IntelliJ uses its own jre.
to force IntelliJ to use it, you need to set the environment variable IDEA_JDK to point to your JDK.
then simply restart intellij and gradle gui plugin should now work.

Answer 2

Man I had so much trouble with this as well, and I don't remember having this much trouble before. I think they changed something. Here are the incantations which got it working for me on Mac OS X 10.11.5, both with Java and Gradle on IntelliJ 2016.1
Here's the summary: install the latest Java JDK from Oracle, add the java_home value to $JAVA_HOME and set that value to $IDEA_HOME (IntelliJ's variable for defining which JDK to use), install gradle (optional) using homebrew, then define the project SDK in IntelliJ.
Here it is broken down from the very beginning of a clean install:
1. Download Java from Oracle's Download Page
2. Use homebrew to install gradle
IntelliJ ships with its own version of Gradle, so this is really optional, and is helpful if you want to use Gradle outside of IntelliJ.
`brew update && brew install gradle`
3. Set the env variables
Paste the following into ~/.profile. These values will work regardless of which version of java or gradle you have installed. Don't set the GRADLE_HOME if you didn't install the standalone gradle.
export JAVA_HOME=$(/usr/libexec/java_home)
export IDEA_JDK=$JAVA_HOME
export GRADLE_HOME=/usr/local/opt/gradle/libexec
4. Set the environment variable to occur at application launch so that IntelliJ sees is using OS X's launchctl program:
launchctl setenv JAVA_HOME $(/usr/libexec/java_home)
5. Define the project SDK
Use the project settings window in IntelliJ to define the project SDK (I don't see this option anywhere else in the global IntelliJ preferences window, this has to be done in the project settings).
6. Wait for the indexes to update, then close and re-open IntelliJ. You should now be able to build the program.

Answer 3

if you are using Intellij version 10.x you should not install any Plugin to run a gradle script.
All you have to do is to go to the Gradle setup (File -> Settings -> Gradle) and set the Gradle Home folder (the location of your Gradle installation, eg. C:\tools\gradle).
You should be able to select a Gradle build file and run it.

Answer 4

Point your JAVA_HOME to JDK, not to JRE.

Answer 5

I think this error might be caused by an install bug with IntelliJ IDEA. When I look at the installed folder referred to in the error message on my filesystem:
C:\Program Files (x86)\JetBrains\IntelliJ IDEA 10.0\jre
I see the jre folder but then another jre folder beneath that one which contains the bin and lib folders of the jre:
jre
jre
bin
lib
I copied bin and lib up a level into the first jre folder, and that fixed this error for me.