title: Why use Gradle detached configurations?
body: <p>I'm reading about Gradle's detached dependency configurations and the <a href="https://gradle.org/docs/current/javadoc/org/gradle/api/artifacts/ConfigurationContainer.html" rel="noreferrer">API docs'</a> method description says <em>"Creates a configuration, but does not add it to this container"</em>. What I'd like to know is </p>
  
  <ol>
  <li>Why would I want to do this? </li>
  <li>At what point would I then re-attach this dependency configuration?</li>
  </ol>
  
  <p>Some initial searching revealed a <a href="http://discuss.gradle.org/t/plugins-should-use-detached-configurations-for-managing-their-user-defined-dependencies-instead-of-adding-configurations-to-the-projects-container/264" rel="noreferrer">plugin related reason</a> but this was not conclusive.</p>