Updating Maven dependencies

The topic of “dependencies” is on the top of mind for many. As I see a lot of these questions coming up, I want to share a few steps which make sense to follow when you need to update your dependencies.

1. Ensure that your AEM SDK version you are referencing is recent. It will ensure that your code has access to the latest libraries AEM CS ships with.
2. Run mvn versions:display-dependency-updates to display all available updates to dependencies. Make sure to update all libraries which you added and which AEM does not come out-of-the-box.
3. And while you are at it, you can run mvn versions:display-plugin-updates as well to see what updated plugin versions are available.

And when you are it: You can also update your Java build toolchain to use a more recent Java version, see the documentation how to do it. Technically it’s not yet required, but even if there’s not ETA yet, the time will come when Java 8 and Java 11 will no longer be supported as build versions.