Last week the Eclipse Foundation published the proposal for the Remus project. In the following I will show you what the goals of the project are and how simple it is to build Eclipse based applications with this technology. We highly appreciate your feedback, suggestions, discussion at the Eclipse Community forums, see http://www.eclipse.org/forums/index.php?t=thread&frm_id=166

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Yesterday I was in Ettlingen at the Eclipse Application Developer Day and listened to Benjamin Muskallas track on Singlesourcing the RCP Mail Example. He explained that it needs 2 modifications of the generated RCP application to get the example running with RAP. The first was modifying some declarative data of the bundle, which is understandable; the second change required a direct edit within the RCP Code because the ActionFactory.ABOUT workbench action is (yet) not supported by RAP. The fact of editing RCP code directly is IMHO a critical point in enabling (probably already delivered) RCP applications. I want to show a way how to avoid such modifications with an aspect orientated approach, I’ve learnt on the EclipseDemo Camp in Leipzig, 3 weeks ago, from the team of ObjectTeam. They provide an extension which is compiled with a modified Eclipse Java Compiler and enables some features for modifying call hierarchies; see the website for details. (more…)

If you want to write a RCP that makes complex data-structure editable, the TableViewer with a CellEditor might becomes your first choice. It has the advantage to make a direct edit in the ui-component in which it is presented. Especially the ComboBoxCellEditor is the preferred way to select a value from a given list of items. But the use of ComboBoxCellEditors should be kept within a limit. If your application makes excessive use of this CellEditor with a heavy amount of items that can be chosen, CellEditors become a usability-nightmare. The following article describes a way how to use existing concepts in the eclipse sdk to avoid user-frustration and improve the usability of your application at the same time. (more…)

The loosely coupling of different application components is one of the most characteristic feature of Eclipse that should also be used by a RCP-developer. Especially because of the interfaces that are defined in eclipse with the extension-framework, you’re able to deliver products that are flexible and easy to customize. Therefore Eclipse gives you all needed tools and formalism to take with them.

If you’re developing an application based on the Eclipse-framework, you’re using primarily the extension-points provided by eclipse itself. The concept of the “late binding” can be and shall be used by a developer of a new eclipse application. Therefore the mechanism is really simple. You’re defining an extension point with a minimalist interface and extending the framework with your interface-implementation.

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I’ve installed a cvs-server where you can directly check out the source-code examples. Furthermore you can download the compiled examples via HTTP. For more Information see the cvs-page.

Developing a Model-Based Editor - TOC

1. Intro
2. Preparation
3. Editor-Inputs
4. Editor-Implementation

A very important element of the Eclipse-Framework are editors. Editors are among views the fundamental element for user-interaction.
Eclipse provides a wonderful framework for creating editors with a reserved area (the “editor area”), where you don’t have to care for common behaviour. Just implement the contribution of the input and provide an implementation for saving the edited input.

What’s the goal of this article?

In the most articles and books is described how to implement an editor for editing a file with a special extension that exists physically in the workspace. But what if you want to use all the functionality the editor comes with, without writing or reading any files, but just pure Java-objects? I want to show you a way how to use in a very easy and clear way how to use simple EditorParts and MultiPageEditorParts with Forms. In addition I want to provide a strategy for managing your editors. At the end will be a eclipse-product, that has a simple view-part with a list (known from the Image-Contribution Product) . If you double-click on a list the object-specified editor will be opened and display the properties of the object, without all the workspace, file and project handling.

Requirements

• Every Object can be handled with an editor
• The Icon will be contributed by the ImageContributor
• The framework knows the objects that were already “opened” by an editor.
• A very easy way to provide new editors for new Java-Objects
• Saving with the given “Dirty-Flag”

Screenshot of the Application

Screenshot of the ready-to-use application

Let’s roll!!!

Download the required plugins as Eclipse-Projects (Source included)
Download the Editors-Best-Practice as RCP (Source included)