Gradle configuration avoidance [POC]

[smola]

What Does This Do

POC on gradle configuration avoidance. I'll eventually open smaller PRs with some changes from here.

Motivation

Additional Notes

Contributor Checklist

• [ ] Format the title according the contribution guidelines
• [ ] Assign the type: and (comp: or inst:) labels in addition to any usefull labels
• [ ] Squash your commits prior merging or merge using GitHub's Squash and merge
• [ ] Don't use close, fix or any linking keywords when referencing an issue.
  Use solves instead, and assign the PR milestone to the issue
• [ ] Update the public documentation in case of new configuration flag or behavior

Jira ticket: [PROJ-IDENT]