PMD: How to exclude a rule imported from a ruleset - pmd

Question

We are using PMD to assess the quality of our "main" source code. We have our own customized ruleset that includes some category rulesets and excludes some specific rules.
Simplified example, file called pmd.xml:
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<ruleset name="Main rules"
xmlns="http://pmd.sourceforge.net/ruleset/2.0.0"
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xsi:schemaLocation="http://pmd.sourceforge.net/ruleset/2.0.0 https://pmd.sourceforge.io/ruleset_2_0_0.xsd">
<description>Main rules</description>
<rule ref="category/java/bestpractices.xml">
<exclude name="GuardLogStatement"/>
</rule>
<rule ref="category/java/security.xml"/>
</ruleset>
Analysis is launched from gradle, it works fine for our "main" source code.
Now we would like to get another more lenient ruleset for our "test" source code. As we don't want to duplicate our set of rules, what we would like to do is import this main ruleset, and exclude some more rules.
So we basically would like to keep the GuardLogStatement excluded, and also exclude rule UnusedPrivateMethod, with a file looking like this one.
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<ruleset name="Test rules"
xmlns="http://pmd.sourceforge.net/ruleset/2.0.0"
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xsi:schemaLocation="http://pmd.sourceforge.net/ruleset/2.0.0 https://pmd.sourceforge.io/ruleset_2_0_0.xsd">
<description>Test rules</description>
<!-- Test rules are based on rules for main -->
<rule ref="./config/pmd.xml">
<exclude name="UnusedPrivateMethod"/>
</rule>
</ruleset>
This doesn't work:
GuardLogStatement is excluded, but
UnusedPrivateMethod still runs.
I don't see any reference in the documentation on how to exclude a rule from a ruleset.
Anyone managed to do something similar?

Answer 1

It turns out this actually works fine.
Pure PEBKAC, the problem was due to my work environment.
I am keeping the question as it demonstrates a nifty way of having a ruleset for the test code derived from the ruleset for the main code.