Eclipse plugin is listed with other plug-ins, but UI contributions are missing - eclipse-plugin

I wrote two Eclipse plugins that work fine when I use Eclipse to run them in another instance of Eclipse. I'd like to distribute the plugins to a relatively small number of people for feedback and was hoping that the dropins folder would provide a quick and dirty solution. When I put the plugins in the dropins folder of my Eclipse installation (Indigo), I see the plugins listed with other plugins in the installation details. The UI contributions are missing and I haven't been able to find any error messages in the logs or otherwise.
As stated, I'm looking for a quick and dirty solution. I intend to build an update site in the future, but would prefer to invest time into that only after getting feedback on the plugins because this is a side project.

It sounds like your plugin is loaded, but isn't started. A 'quick and dirty' solution is to have it use the org.eclipse.ui.startup extention point so it is activated on startup.
Another possibility is that your UI additions just aren't activated for the perspective, which you can fix by running Window > Customize Perspective.

Related

How to make a ExternalSystemRunConfiguration of type Application, in IntelliJ plugin

So, I've been looking around for this for awhile, and since Jetbrains doesn't really document Plugin development for their IDEs, I just haven't been able to find the answer. I just need to figure out what I should be using in the constructor of ExternalSystemRunConfiguration if I'm making a Application run configuration Like this one
The "Application" run configuration is implemented by the ApplicationConfiguration class, not by ExternalSystemRunConfiguration.

Setup IntelliJ IDEA 12 with Play2 and framework sources (java)

I'm using IntelliJ IDEA 12, its Play2.0 plugin for a Java project.
Unfortunately Play 2 (2.1.4 at this time) does not ship with the sources for its dependencies, and running idea with-sources=yes only downloads the project's dependencies sources.
So far I've had to manually download the source jars and attach them whenever I needed them.
Of course I have to redo this every time the Play framework is updated.
Is there any better way, either within play, which I would prefer, or with an external solution?
Unfortunately IDEA's "Search in internet..." button usually doesn't work, most likely because it's looking on the wrong respositories. I suspect it is trying to use the Maven settings with the configured Nexus repos, but AFAIK Maven central is not in there.
It is as simple as running update-classifiers in the Play console and then regenerating the project files.
I wish this would be done automatically, but apparently it is too obvious to sbt users.

How to add different programming languages to Eclipse (C++, C#, Java)

another completely beginner question. I just went through two introductory courses in Java, and I noticed that Eclipse can also support development in other languages (which I didn't know). Does anyone know how to add other languages to Eclipse so that I can switch between IDE's, or do I have to have a completely separate installation of Eclipse per language?
In Eclipse, use the menu Help -> Install new software. Choose "All available sites" in the combo box, wait a moment and then you can explore some other available plugins and languages.
Depending on your version of Eclipse, you might also have a menu item Help -> Eclipse Marketplace. That one is even more comfortable, as it allows you to easily browse all plugins listed in the Eclipse Marketplace. You can also browse the marketplace in your browser and afterwards drag and drop interesting plugins from the browser to your running eclipse (if your version of eclipse is new enough).
Eclipse is a plugin framework......
You have two choices - fortunately the eclipse community saw fit to produce Eclipse in a range of products that will do 99% of what 99% of people want. These distros are good to go. You install them and start work. You can then extend them if you want, but they do all of the basics very well, reliably, out of the box. Installing more than one with eclipse is easy, they do not interfere with each other, and if one turns out to be broken, the rest are not affected.
The other option, is to extend the framework by adding the plugins you want. So you start with an Eclipse distro, and download and install plugins till the cows come home. In the perfect world, this would be the perfect solution. Its not a perfect world..... you have not installed all you plugins and Eclipse suddenly crashes........
Problems occur because sometimes
Plugins are buggy
Plugins are incompatible with each other.
Different plugins rely on different versions of another one
(indirectly incompatible).
Plugins don't work the way the rest of the tool does
There are just too many plugins to choose from - you don't need most, and the ones you need can be hard to find.
Adding more than a few (probably 1) plugin to Eclipse exposes you to these problems. This is not something for the novice or people who have job not involved in fixing Eclipse. if you have a real reason for it, like your a sadist, or it's your job, or you want it to be your job, to make a team of 100 Devs productive, then plugins are great, otherwise, download a pre-canned, tested, reliable distro and take advantage of the great work by the contributors.

How to write an IntelliJ IDEA Plugin?

IDEA has many plugins to use. I.e. IDEtalk is one of them which I use. How can I code a simple plugin that just connects to Internet and shows a web page? (no need for an address bar but it is not a problem to be). I want my plugin's shortcut's button locate at my IDE as like IDEtalk, Commander, Maven Projects etc.
Any ideas?
Check the documentation and the source code of the other plug-ins available in the public git repository of the Community Edition.
There is a Creating Your First Plugin guide on JetBrains web site. It covers all the needed steps from plugin creation to deployment to the plugin repository.
You might also want take a look in the source code of a simple plugin like Twitter Integration Plugin which I recently implemented. Or check a more complex one like this one.

Use maven2 for build-automation and continuous integration of an eclipse rcp project?

My company starts a new project next week. We have planned to develop the application with eclipse rcp. The build process should be fully automated, so we're prepared to set up a continuous integration environment (e.g. Continuum). For the build-automation-part I intended to use maven2, because I want use its dependency management.
I have used maven2 for a small old-style java project, but have never set up maven for using it with eclipse rcp.
What's the best way to do this? Basic concepts? Common traps? Are any tutorials or book's around there? The tutorials and informations I found, seemed outdated or incomplete.
PS: The main project will be divided into sub-project's (plug-in's). But I think this is typical for eclipse rcp projects.
You should take a look at Tycho:
the-future-of-maven-osgi-join-the-tycho-users-mailing-list
the-next-generation-of-build-tools-for-eclipse-plugins-and-rcp-applications
Like most Maven questions, this is solved by a link to a plug-in:
"pde-maven-plugin"
Other advice:
use the assembly plug-in to build
the update site
consider using hudson rather than
Continuum
I've been battling maven2/Eclipse RCP integration for some time. The key is not so much getting your setup right: You can get it to work - eventually - by reverse-engineering Eclipse's build process in maven.
In my experience, the hard part is keeping everything up to date. Every time Eclipse revs their libs, you'll find yourself re-writing a bunch of pom files for that newest RCP widget or SWT lib. Naturally, CI helps with this somewhat. The problem is that Eclipse and maven are very particular about the way they do the business of building, and their approaches are quite different. To make matters worse, PDE dev (and Eclipse dev, more generally) is powered by a lot of wizard code, which is sometimes quite opaque as to what's happening behind the scenes.
The question you really need to ask yourself is if it's worth the effort. In my particular case, I believe it has been. (CI is too good to live without.) But the trade-off is that you may find yourself being the "build guy", which can take valuable time away from actual development, which is probably what you enjoy most.
I've got recently the same problem : build eclipse RCP application through continuous integration.
I haven't applied them yet but I've found some interesting articles :
Here's the documentation for Tycho
Building Eclipse Plugins with Maven 2 on eclipse.org
Build Eclipse RCP products using Maven 2 - how hard can it be? from Immo Hüneke's blog
Here's an article about PDE build automation
Here's a shell script to automate JUnit test launch