updated dependencies and updated all usages accordingly, replaced deprecated methods, and updated project to JDK 25

gradle/wrapper/gradle-wrapper.properties

@@ -1,7 +1,9 @@
 distributionBase=GRADLE_USER_HOME
 distributionPath=wrapper/dists
-distributionUrl=https\://services.gradle.org/distributions/gradle-8.10-bin.zip
+distributionUrl=https\://services.gradle.org/distributions/gradle-9.6.1-bin.zip
 networkTimeout=10000
+retries=0
+retryBackOffMs=500
 validateDistributionUrl=true
 zipStoreBase=GRADLE_USER_HOME
 zipStorePath=wrapper/dists