* issue_863: Successfully moved all the dependencies to toml file and currently replacing dependencies listed in the build.gradle file with the ones referenced in the toml file
* issue_863: finished updating dependency versions. Ready for PR
* issue_863: downgraded versions since there was an issue with the dependencies versions and the ci/cd pipeline in git. will update each depedency slowly to ensure that upgrades are down correctly.
* issue_863: upgrading this slowly but surely
* issue_863: upgrading this slowly but surely again. testing to see if github's ci/cd is happy still with these set of changes.
* issue_863: upgrading this slowly but surely again. testing to see if github's ci/cd is happy still with these set of changes (again)
* issue_863: upgrading this slowly but surely again. testing to see if github's ci/cd is happy still with these set of changes (again) partIII
* issue_863: Part IV of upgrading this slowly to see if github's ci/cd is happy still with these set of changes (again)
* issue_863: Part V of upgrading this slowly to see if github's ci/cd is happy still with these set of changes (again)
* issue_863: Part VI of updating dependencies slowly
* issue_863: Part VII of updating dependencies
* issue_863: Part 8 of updating dependencies
* issue_863: Part 9 of updating dependencies
* issue_863: Part 10 of updating dependencies
* issue_863: Part 12 of updating dependencies
* issue_863: Part 13 of updating dependencies
* issue_863: Part 14 of updating dependencies
* issue_863: Part 15 of updating dependencies
* issue_863: Updating tomcat core.
* issue_863: removed some critical vulnerable dependencies
* issue_863: updated spring boot version. second try at it.
* issue_863: undid spring update. need to figure out how to smoothly transition to newer spring.
* issue_863: updated spring boot, hibernate, and spring retry. Removed an unused dependency.
* issue_863: removed unused dependencies and am currently resolving critical vulnerable dependendcies
* issue_863: reverted changes from last commit. let's see if that makes a difference
* issue_863: Updated gradle version, fixed more vulnerabilities, now figuring what to do with the remaining vulnerabilities.
* issue_863: Updated gradle plugins version, fixed more vulnerabilities, now figuring what to do with the remaining vulnerabilities.
* issue_863: Updated gradle plugins version again. Ready for PR. Vulnerability issues will be addressed in another PR. I've cut down vulnerabilities by quite a lot and I want to test the new OWASP plugin against the remaining vulnerabilities.
* issue_863: Finishing touches to the PR. Upgraded some more dependencies and removed unused one.
* issue_863: Removed testng from codebase. Has been officially replaced with spring junit.
