Eclipse plugin compiled in linux work on windows? - java

I have developed an eclipse plugin, which is compiled linux using maven Tycho plugin. But for some reason, I am not able to see the plugin in the eclipse running on windows. I am not finding anything in the log file.
As I am new to plugin development, Is there any difference does a cross platform compiled plugin would cause?
One dilemma I have in my mind is that, Does it really matter if I use windows based eclipse installation on linux, (as it is just a zip, extract it and use it) machine for compiling and building my plugin? Well, to me it appears that it does matters. I should use linux based eclipse for compiling a plugin in linux operating system.
But isn't this what is against java principle? Compile and Run anywhere?

as far as I know, if you are using UI stuff inside that plugin then you have to export it for multiple OSes ... and you need some libraries from eclipse website to export your application in linux...
If you are exporting only the plugin then you need nothing... OSGI takes care of everything

Some of the Eclipse packages are system dependent. To take one example, org.eclipse.core.resources.win32.x86 would work only on a 32 bit Windows workstation.
Check your plug-in and see if you have any of these system dependent Eclipse packages.
If you do, you have to export your plug-in with the appropriate Eclipse packages for each of the environments you want your plug-in to run.
Write once, run anywhere is a myth. Ask any Android programmer. :-)

Related

Can't integrate SWT with JavaFX under "Zulu" JDK 11

We want to use both SWT and JavaFX in an Eclipse plugin within our RCP application. Unfortunately, we're experiencing problems integrating SWT with JavaFX under Java 11. The build environment uses e(fx)clipse 3.5. We're developing against the Community edition of Azul Systems' "Zulu" JDK 11, bundled with Azul's version of OpenJFX.
Formerly, we developed under Java 8. At that point, our build used a compile-time class path referring to jfxswt.jar, which lived in the jre/lib directory of the JDK. We didn't use any special class path settings at run-time.
We are now trying to move to Java 11. There, this JAR has become javafx-swt.jar and lives in the lib directory of the JDK. It no longer seems to be enough to set the class path to refer to this JAR at compile time: it seems to be necessary to do so at run time too. If we don't do this, we get an error (java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: javafx/embed/swt/FXCanvas).
As a test, we experimentally embedded javafx-swt.jar within the JAR implementing our Eclipse plugin. We then referred to it in that plugin's .classpath file, and the code worked as expected. Unfortunately, we can't embed the JAR this way for legal and other reasons.
A note on Java modules: javafx.swt does not show up in the output when we issue the --list-module command. We tried running the application using parameters -p /path/to/JDK/lib/javafx-swt.jar --add-modules javafx.swt, but this doesn't seem to solve the problem.
My question: Is there a way to set up the class or module path to allow our Eclipse plugin to find this library in the JRE? Any solution would have to work with whatever JRE the code happens to be run against (I think it is all right to assume lib/javafx-swt.jar will live in that JRE).
Would it help to use a separately-downloaded version of OpenJFX rather than the copy of OpenJFX in our JDK?
Very many thanks ☺

Java Tool Notarize process

we have developed GUI tool using Java SE 11 , packaged using Maven. Recommend user to download and set Java in system path to launch the tool. Batch file for windows and .command file for Mac and Linux. Do we need to get notarize approval from apple to use it in Mac OS. Please advice
Thanks
You don't need Notarization for the script files. For your GUI Tool it highly depends on your projects dependencies. If your project only use common java packages, then everything should be fine. But there are libaries which require notarization. I personally had this issue with the net.java.dev.jna dependency. My experience is based on a jar bundled within an application. I am not sure if it is the same for a jar excuted from a script only. I recommend to just build your app and try to run it on a catalina machine.

Executing Eclipse plugin (jdt/ast) outside eclipse IDE environment

Can I execute Eclipse Java development tools as a standalone process? I need to get Java program's AST structure using Eclipse JDT from another program, and to do that, I need to execute eclipse plugin as a stand-alone process behind the scene.
Is that possible? If so, how one can do that?
Eclipse/jdt and eclipse/ast is nothing more than a jar file, so one can use them to build standalone java application.
Example
I googled to find ASTExplorer as an example to make eclipse/ast plugin as a standalone java project.
The program was targeted for pretty old eclipse (3.0.2), I downloaded the 3.0.2 for Mac OS X this site - http://archive.eclipse.org/eclipse/downloads/drops/R-3.0.2-200503110845/
You need to setup ECLIPSE_HOME classpath variables in Preference -> Java -> Classpath variables
The .classpath has those classpath variables already, you can refer to this post - .classpath contents update in eclipse. As you can see it refers eclipse/jdt(art) jar files. I'm pretty sure one can change the reference to the newest version of jdt/ast without downloading the 3.0.2 version.
As I use Mac, I need to replace the swt for PC with swt for Mac. I could do that in BuildPath/Configure Build path
First remove the PC swt reference.
Then add the correct Mac swt reference.
Compile the example with the eclipse indigo/on mac
When the setup is correct, eclipse starts building the project. You can use Project -> Build Project menu. Then, you can check the application works fine in eclipse.
Generate the executable jar
Export to executable jar file.
You'll get some warnings, but you'll have a jar file.
Execute the generated jar
Just executing java -jar ast.jar doesn't work on Mac, I got a hint from this post.
Running SWT based, cross-platform jar properly on a Mac
In short, you need to run java -XstartOnFirstThread -jar ast.jar
Does it have to be Eclipses's AST? Or is any AST generation o.k.? If it doesn't have to be eclipse, I'd suggest Habelitz open source Java AST Compiler. http://www.habelitz.com/ I'm using it myself for some projects....
Well, of course you can launch eclipse just like any other process : How to create a process in Java
And then the problem becomes relaying the information back to the original process, which gets kind of messy. My suggested approach in this case would probably be to create a plugin in eclipse and have that plugin do whatever it is you think you need the AST for. You can work out messages with command line options to eclipse, or a shared file or something.

Java packaging tools - alternatives for jsmooth, launch4j, onejar

I have used these three open source tools for packaging my java apps, but they all look like abandon-ware now. All three are very good pieces of software. What are the options now? (or is using Java for desktop app development no longer a "hot" market for app developers to build & maintain these tools?).
1) exe wrapper:
jsmooth - no new development in 2.5 years - does not support 64 bit.
launch4j - no new development in over a year, supports 64 bit, but you can't sign the exe created by launch4j, so I prefer jsmooth, but it does not support 64 bit.
2) onejar:
It works, but there has been no new development or web site update in more than 2.5 years. So, just want to switch to something that's supported / have a backup plan if it suddenly breaks with a new build of Java.
Thanks
Edgar
Launch4j has just been updated ! http://launch4j.sourceforge.net/changelog.html
Did you check IzPack? This is a great piece of software to create cross-platform installers:
IzPack is an installers generator for the Java platform. It produces lightweight installers that can be run on any operating system where a Java virtual machine is available. Depending on the operating system, it can be launched by a double-click or a simple 'java -jar installer.jar' on a shell. The most common use is to distribute applications for the Java platform, but you can also use it for other kinds of projects. The main benefit of IzPack is that it provides a clean and unique way of distributing a project to users using different operating systems.
Some really famous companies and projects use it for many years (Sun Microsystems, JBoss/RedHat, the Scala language project, some ObjectWeb/OW2 projects, XWiki and many more). If it's good for them, it should be good for you :)
Since none of the answers were approved, and JavaFX 2.2 has not been mentioned above (was not available at the time of the answers) here goes:
JavaFX 2.2 (part of Java Runtime and SDK since 7u6) allows building native exe/dmg/rpm's that tag along the full RT component as well. I believe this is a valid answer to your need, as well as an officially supported solution from Oracle.
https://blogs.oracle.com/talkingjavadeployment/entry/native_packaging_for_javafx
Have you tried IzPack (http://izpack.org/)?
You can try
http://winrun4j.sourceforge.net/
Has an exe with 64bit support and is quite easy to configure with an ini file.
As I was fed up with recent security changes in Java Webstart, I created my own tool, JNDT. It's under GPL.
It goes farther than akauppi's suggestion because it allows to create GNU Linux packages even under Mac and Windows :) I use it to create Mac bundle under GNU Linux too. For the moment, it's just a single Ant library with a few dependencies that allows to create native self-contained application bundles for GNU Linux, Mac OS X and Windows. I use it for my first person shooter and I'm very happy with it. It bundles the JRE but it can use the system JRE if you want.
P.S: JNDT is able to create a native Windows installer as an executable with NSIS even under GNU Linux.
I understand that the GPL license discourages some developers to use my tool. In this case, rather use PackR.
Maven 2 provides the ability to create a jar which contains all the dependencies as part of its assembly plugin. This combined with the jar plugin configuration of the manifest file (and specifically setting Main-class to the Class with main) is all you need to do basic packaging.
To some extent Java web start is now considered the better way to distribute Java applications and Maven 2's assembly capability combined with web start gets you everything you need without going via the exe route.
If you just want an exe (instead of a full-blown installer) you can make one with NSIS:
http://nsis.sourceforge.net/Java_Launcher_with_automatic_JRE_installation
Yes, NSIS is an installer but you can have it just run a jar in the same directory by stripping out all of the installer stuff. Basically it works like launch4j but is a lot more configurable.
If you are using gradle, there is a plugin that uses launch4j (under the hood) and works great. It doesn't even require you to download or install launch4j, it is totally automated.
https://github.com/TheBoegl/gradle-launch4j

How well do Eclipse and Netbeans coexist?

I would like to have both Eclipse and Netbeans (with JUnit) installed on one system, so I can be somewhat familiar with both.
Besides GUI development (see "Using both Eclipse and Netbeans"), are there any other issues with using both IDEs on the same system, or even the same project?
We regularly use both Netbeans and Eclipse. We switch back and forth, between Vista, WinXP, and multiple versions of Fedora of the 32- and 64-bit variety, with no problems. Keeping the project files in version control makes keeping them in sync much easier. We even keep the launch files in the project directory as well. I posted a answer to another multiple IDEs question that describes what our project directory looks like.
Basically, I agree with Bill the Lizard about there being no issues, but disagree about the seamless nature and keeping the project files separate. The only thing we have to do is make sure that we update the build classpath in each project if a new library is added because Netbeans and Eclipse use different files to describe the classpath.
Using the IDE version control system integrations helps to encourage keeping the projects up to date for everyone else.
One thing that makes developing single project in NetBeans and Eclipse is using maven to keep dependencies together. Maven will generate IDE specific files that contain all classpath information, buildpaths etc.
Maven has pretty steep learning curve, but it is worth learning.
There are no issues at all with having them on the same system. However, each have their own project specific files, so using them on the same project isn't seamless. This is made a lot easier if you're using source control and keep your (non-source code) project files separate.
Maven is a very good way to keep both IDEs in sync (as suggested). In my experience though, you have to create an Ant build for any given project for the sake of developers not using IDEs. Since NetBeans's build system is based on Ant, it's pretty trivial to just base the entire NetBeans project off of that base build system. A little bit of tweaking in the project.xml ensures that the editor classpath is kept in sync with the Ant build classpath.
Netbeans 6.5 has an improved Eclipse project import which is supposed to sync changes from Netbeans back to Eclipse: http://wiki.netbeans.org/NewAndNoteWorthyNB65#section-NewAndNoteWorthyNB65-EclipseProjectImportAndSynchronization

Categories

Resources