What is the principle of Maven dependency inheritance?

The principle of Maven dependency is to automatically load the directly dependent libraries as well as their transitive dependencies into the project by resolving the project’s dependency relationships.

Maven utilizes an XML file called POM (Project Object Model) to manage a project’s dependencies. Within the POM file, a project can specify the coordinates (groupId, artifactId, version) of other libraries it depends on. When Maven builds a project, it downloads the necessary libraries from a remote repository based on the defined dependencies in the POM file and adds them to the project’s classpath.

Transitive dependency is a core feature of Maven, allowing developers to only specify direct dependencies without manually managing all transitive dependencies. Maven automatically searches and loads all other libraries that are required by direct dependencies when resolving a project’s dependency tree, until the complete dependency tree is built.

Maven utilizes an algorithm called “Shortest Path First” to resolve dependency conflicts. When multiple direct dependencies rely on different versions of the same library, Maven will select one version and add it to the project. Typically, Maven will choose the newest version, but developers can also manually specify the desired version.

In general, Maven’s dependency inheritance principle involves parsing the dependencies defined in the POM file and automatically loading all direct dependencies and their transitive dependencies into the project. This way, developers only need to focus on the project’s direct dependencies without manually managing all transitive dependencies.