[GR-58918] Make HomeFinder.getVersion or equivalent available in org.graalvm.sdk:nativeimage without dependency on polyglot

[zakkak]

Feature request

When graal-sdk got split in the four maven artifacts (in GraalVM for JDK 21):

• org.graalvm.polyglot » polyglot
• org.graalvm.sdk » collections
• org.graalvm.sdk » nativeimage
• org.graalvm.sdk » word

HomeFinder was packaged in org.graalvm.polyglot:polyglot, as a result to get the native-image version being used during compilation (e.g. in a native image Feature) one needs to either depend on polyglot, even if not using it, or implement a similar API.

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
In Quarkus we implement similar logic to the one offered by HomeFinder.getVersion in quarkusio/quarkus#43696 in order to be able to get the version at build time without depending on polyglot. While that works fine for Quarkus I suspect that it's something useful to a broader audience and would preferably be fixed in GraalVM.

Describe the solution you'd like.
I would like to be able to programmatically get the native-image version at build-time, e.g. in a custom Feature, without the need to bring in the polyglot dependency.

Describe who do you think will benefit the most.
Developers of libraries and frameworks which depend on GraalVM, as they will be able to make compile time decisions based on the GraalVM version being used (e.g. to test new features are adapt to new defaults).

Describe alternatives you've considered.
Quarkus already implements its own alternative.

Express whether you'd like to help contributing this feature
I am willing to implement the solution we will agree on.

[selhagani]

Hi @zakkak,

Thank you for reaching out to us! I shared this with our dev team and I'll make sure to keep you updated.