Extreme Java

When registering files on NBM’s layer file, you can define attributes, too:

<file name="my-pkg-MyClass.instance">
  <attr name="mystr" stringvalue="value"/>
  <attr name="myint" intvalue="1"/>
  <attr name="mymethod"
    methodvalue="my.pkg.MyClass.myMethod"/>
</file>

They are avaliable as attributes of FileObject (through getAttribute). You can also use special attributes “instanceClass” to define a different class to instantiate or “instanceCreate” to define a factory method. This factory method can receive a map of attributes. I’m using it to customize a generic DataLoader:

public class MyLoader extends MultiDataLoader {
  private MyDataLoader(String secondaryExt) {
    super("MyObject");
    this.secondaryExt = secondaryExt;
  }
  public static build(Map<String, Object> attrs) {
    return new MyLoader(attrs.get("ext").toString());
  }
  ...
}

Two days ago, NetBeans 6.7 was released. These are the new features I tested:

• Maven integration was improved with autocomplete and dependency graph;
• Profiler’s HeapWalker supports OQL - very useful if you do memory tunning;
• Hudson server management and a status bar icon with build status.

See more at release page!

If you want to use NetBeans Platform and JPA together, there’s a great tutorial on NB’s site. Unfortunatelly, it explains how to do it with an external database and using an external JAR for your entities.

If you want to have a entity module with your classes (instead of an external JAR and a library wrapper), no big deal - it works! You can follow GJ’s tutorial, but you will create a module project instead and you will not have NB’s wizards to help creating entity classes.

I also created a module install on my Derby wrapper, with this line:

FileUtil configRoot = FileUtil.getConfigRoot();
System.setProperty("derby.system.home",
    FileUtil.toFile(configRoot).getCanonicalPath());

This defines where Derby will create database files (user’s dir, in this case).

BTW, if a “no suitable driver found” is thrown, you forgot to add a dependency between JPA wrapper (EclipseLink, TopLink, OpenJPA or Hibernate) and JDBC wrapper.

Finally, NB 6.5 was released! Grab your copy!

Unfortunatelly the download link is blocked here… I hate proxies…

This one I posted in NetBeans mailing lists. If you want to show a special char (like a slash - “/”) in the action display name (i.e. in the way your user will see it), the right way is to pass it to the AbstractAction constructor (just like the templates of NetBeans):

public class SpecialCopyPasteAction extends AbstractAction {

  public SpecialCopyPasteAction() {
    super(NbBundle.getMessage(SpecialCopyPasteAction.class,
        "CTL_ SpecialCopyPasteAction"));
  }

  public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent evt) {
    // TODO: Implement it
  }
}

And, in Bundle.properties:

CTL_SpecialCopyPasteAction=Special Copy/Paste

Remember that the action name in layer.xml is mapped to a system file name. You cannot put a “/” on file names, even on Windows. This is one of the reasons NB filesystem has the localization feature.

In a previous post, I’ve told that I want to use NetBeans and share projects with developers that still use Eclipse. In another post, I added a custom folder to the project view.

Now, I will add a custom menu item to run an ant task outside NB’s build scripts:

1. Assuming you have a NB module project ready, you just need to add a new entry in your layer.xml:

   <folder name="Projects">
     <folder name="Actions">
       <file name="org-mycompany-MyMenuAction.instance"/>
     </folder>
   </folder>

2. Create a new class with the same name (org.mycompany.MyMenuAction):

   public final class TransitMenuAction
     extends AbstractAction
     implements Presenter.Popup, ContextAwareAction {
   
     public final static String DISPLAY_NAME =
       NbBundle.getMessage(TransitMenuAction.class,
         "CTL_TransitMenuAction");
   
     private Lookup context;
   
     public TransitMenuAction() {
       this(null);
     }
     public TransitMenuAction(Lookup context) {
       super(DISPLAY_NAME);
       this.context = context;
     }
   
     public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent e) {
       // I'm a menu container... I do nothing
     }
   
     public Action createContextAwareInstance(
       Lookup context) {
       return new MyMenuAction(context);
     }
     public JMenuItem getPopupPresenter() {
       return new PopupPresenter();
     }
   
     /** Dynamic menu factory */
     class PopupPresenter extends JMenuItem
       implements DynamicMenuContent {
   
       public JComponent[] getMenuPresenters() {
         Project proj = context.lookup(Project.class);
         // MyUtils comes from last post
         if (!MyUtils.isMyProject(proj)) {
           // hides this menu
           return new JComponent[0];
         }
   
         JMenu mnu = new JMenu(DISPLAY_NAME);
         mnu.add(new PackageAction(context));
         return new JComponent[] { mnu };
       }
       public JComponent[] synchMenuPresenters(
         JComponent[] items) {
         return items;
       }
     }
   }

3. And, the PackageAction is:

   public class PackageAction extends AbstractAction {
     private Lookup context;
     public PackageAction(Lookup context) {
       super(NbBundle.getMessage(PackageAction.class,
         "CTL_PackageAction"));
       this.context = context;
     }
   
     /* This action will copy a file and run an Ant task */
     public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent e) {
       try {
         /* Both the file and the build scripts are under
          * the "ant" folder in project directory
          */
         Project proj = context.lookup(Project.class);
         FileObject antFolder = proj.getProjectDirectory().
           getFileObject("ant");
   
         // Read the original file
         FileObject def = antFolder.
           getFileObject("compile-default.properties");
         Properties prop = new Properties();
         prop.load(def.getInputStream());
   
         // Change a little bit
         // TODO: Add this to a property window
         prop.setProperty("compile.lib.ext",
           "C:\\etc\\apache-tomcat-6.0.14\\lib");
   
         // Write to the copy file
         FileObject cpy = antFolder
           .getFileObject("compile.properties");
         if (cpy == null) {
           cpy = antFolder.createData("compile.properties");
         }
         FileLock lock = cpy.lock();
         try {
           prop.store(cpy.getOutputStream(lock),
             "any cool comment");
         } finally {
           lock.releaseLock();
         }
   
         // Now, we will run Ant - grab the script...
         FileObject buildXML = antFolder
           .getFileObject("build.xml");
   
         // ... and run the "package" target
         ActionUtils.runTarget(buildXML,
            new String[]{ "package" }, null);
       } catch (IOException ex) {
         Exceptions.printStackTrace(ex);
       } catch (IllegalArgumentException ex) {
         Exceptions.printStackTrace(ex);
       }
     }
   }

4. Last, but not least, the project dependencies:
   1. Ant (ActionUtils)
   2. Filesystem API (FileObject and FileLock);
   3. Project API (Project);
   4. UI Utilities API (DynamicMenuContent); and
   5. Utilities API (Lookup)

And, your new project menu item (that calls an Ant task) is ready.

In a previous post, I’ve told that I want to use NetBeans and share projects with developers that still use Eclipse. Since we have a custom requirements, I plan to customize the way NB handle these projects.

As you will notice, every NB project customization will go into the layer file, under “Projects” folder. You will be surprised on how easy it goes.

In this post, my task is to make a “config” folder visible under “Projects” tab of NetBeans. Assuming you already have a NetBeans module project ready, steps are:

1. Create an utility class with this method:

   public static boolean isMyProject(Project proj) {
     // check if it is a nb project
     if (proj.getProjectDirectory().getFileObject("nbproject") ==
       null) {
       return false;
     }
     // check if our custom folder exists
     return (proj.getProjectDirectory().getFileObject("config") !=
       null);
   }

2. In your layer.xml, create an entry named “Projects / type-of-your-desired-project / Nodes”. You can look into “Important Files / XML Layer / Projects / org-netbeans-modules-xxx-project / Nodes” and right click on it to add a new file - NB will add the “folder” tags automatically;
3. Inside “Nodes”, add a file named “org-mycompany-MyCompanyNodeFactory.instance” (or rename the file if you created it on step 1);
4. Now, create a class named “org.mycompany.MyCompanyNodeFactory” that implements NodeFactory. This is a pretty small one:

   public class MyNodeFactoryImpl implements NodeFactory {
     public NodeList createNodes(Project proj) {
       if (MyUtils.isMyProject(project) {
         try {
           MyFilesNode nd = new MyFilesNode(proj);
           return NodeFactorySupport.fixedNodeList(nd);
         } catch (DataObjectNotFoundException ex) {
           Exceptions.printStackTrace(ex);
         }
       }
       // if we can't use it, return an empty list
       return NodeFactorySupport.fixedNodeList();
     }
   }

5. Create the MyFilesNode. It must be a child of Node. You can do anything you want here (just Google it and you will see what I mean). Mine is:

   public class MyFilesNode extends AbstractNode {
     private static Image smallImage =
             Utilities.loadImage("/path-to/icon-8x8.gif"); // NOI18N
   
     public MyFilesNode(Project proj) {
       super(Children.create(new MyChildFactory(proj), true);
     }
     public String getDisplayName() {
       return "My Files";
     }
     // A bonus: this snippet will merge NB folder icon and
     // your 8x8 icon
     @Override
     public Image getIcon(int type) {
       DataFolder root = DataFolder.findFolder(
         Repository.getDefault().getDefaultFileSystem().getRoot());
       Image original = root.getNodeDelegate().getIcon(type);
       return Utilities.mergeImages(original, smallImage, 7, 7);
     }
     @Override
     public Image getOpenedIcon(int type) {
       DataFolder root = DataFolder.findFolder(
         Repository.getDefault().getDefaultFileSystem().getRoot());
       Image original = root.getNodeDelegate().getIcon(type);
       return Utilities.mergeImages(original, smallImage, 7, 7);
     }
   }

   And, of course, the ChildFactory is:

   public class MyChildFactory extends ChildFactory<String> {
     private Project proj;
   
     public TransitFilesChildren(Project proj) {
       this.proj = proj;
     }
   
     /* Since a node is the visual representation of
      * something else, this method builds the list
      * of "something else"s we want to show. If this
      * was a business application, the "key" could be
      * a value object. In this module, the key will
      * be the name of the custom folder.
      */
     @Override
     protected boolean createKeys(List<String> keys) {
       keys.add("ant");    // another folder - why not?
       keys.add("config");
       return true;
     }
   
     @Override
     protected Node createNodeForKey(String key) {
       // 1. Find the FileObject for the folder
       FileObject fo = proj.getProjectDirectory().getFileObject(key);
       // 2. Find the DataFolder for the FileObject
       DataFolder df = DataFolder.findFolder(fo);
       // 3. Create a custom filter
       DataFilter filter = new MyDataFilter();
       // 4. Get DataFolder children (with filter)
       Children children = df.createNodeChildren(filter);
       // 5. Create a proxy lookup
       Lookup lookup = new ProxyLookup(new Lookup[]{
         df.getNodeDelegate().getLookup(), proj.getLookup()
       });
       // 6. Create a filter node
       return new FilterNode(df.getNodeDelegate(), children, lookup);
     }
   
     /**
      * Filter DataObjects that must not be shown (like .svn folders)
      */
     static final class MyDataFilter implements ChangeListener,
       ChangeableDataFilter {
   
       private final ChangeSupport changeSupport =
         new ChangeSupport(this);
   
       public MyDataFilter() {
         VisibilityQuery.getDefault().addChangeListener(this);
       }
       public boolean acceptDataObject(DataObject obj) {
         FileObject fo = obj.getPrimaryFile();
         return VisibilityQuery.getDefault().isVisible(fo);
       }
       public void stateChanged(ChangeEvent e) {
         changeSupport.fireChange();
       }
       public void addChangeListener(ChangeListener listener) {
         changeSupport.addChangeListener(listener);
       }
       public void removeChangeListener(ChangeListener listener) {
         changeSupport.removeChangeListener(listener);
       }
     }
   }

6. Now, go toproject properties and add the following modules (you can also search for the needed classes):
   1. Datasystems API (ChangeableDataFilter, DataFilter, DataFolder and DataObject);
   2. Filesystem API (FileObject);
   3. General Queries API (VisibilityQuery);
   4. Nodes API (ChildFactory, Children, FilterNode and Node);
   5. Project API (Project);
   6. Utilities API (ChangeSupport, Lookup and ProxyLookup);

Now, if you run the project, you will notice the new folder under Projects view.

In my job, they officially use Eclipse Europa to develop. I really dislike Eclipse - it is a matter of taste. Because of this, I’m using NetBeans ability to share projects (like in this demo) - and it works like a charm.

But, since even rose has its thorn, they have some custom tasks here:

1. Inside every project, there’s a “config” folder with some files that must be copied to a “/var/xxx” folder before running the application;
2. A custom ant build script to create a ZIP file that will go to test and production environments; and
3. The file from step 2 must be transfered via SFTP to specific servers, on a folder named like “/var/deploy/xxx”.

These are manually-repeated tasks that must be done for every project. Eclipse users (here) must do it step-by-step. NetBeans users will use a (custom) brand-new module that I developed to do these tasks.

Just to enumerate, we need to solve these problems:

1. The “config” folder must be visible in “Projects” tab (it is under “Files” tab, but it is ugly);
2. An ant task in a custom build script must be called whenever I want;
3. The “config” folder must be copied to “/var/xxx” when the project is compiled;
4. An ZIP file must be sent via SFTP to a “/var/deploy/xxx” folder;
5. I don’t want to hardcode the “xxx” - what about a new tab on project properties?

OK. We have a lot of things to cover here. But, they are very simple. Since it could become a large post, I’ll cover them in other posts (that will be have a pingback here, on comments section).

I’m trying NetBeans 6.1 Beta. It is pretty stable to a beta, but I got a little problem: the “Find Usages” resource has some kind of memory leak. I sent the log using NetBeans’ built-in feature and voilá: it was sent successfully, and, like a charm, the server told me the issue was already sent by another user and is FIXED - yup, they are quick.

For the folks that laugh at Windows “send error” button, just take a look at the screenshot:

And, if you want to, you can see the report number 13304, and the issue #125531.

This one is one of the weirdest (and useful) things I ever seen in 16 years of my life as a developer (I’m 26, BTW)… OpenOffice is a very powerful Office Automation solution… NetBeans Plaform is a very powerful application platform… Can you imagine what you get when you mix both together? Yup, this is possible. With NB and OOo installed, you just need to create a NB Module with following JARs from OOo:

• juh.jar
• jurt.jar
• officebean.jar
• ridl.jar
• unoil.jar

I created another module with a single TopComponent, and add this snippet:

private OOoBean oo;

@Override
public void componentOpened() {
  add(oo = new OOoBean());
  oo.loadFromURL("private:factory/swriter", null);
  oo.aquireSystemWindow();
}

But, this will NOT work… If you try to run it, an exception will be thrown, because OOo libs (.DLL/.SO) will not be found. They only exists in OOo install folder, and are automagically found by OOo classes - only if they aren’t moved from the “classes” folder in OOo installation.

The workaround is a couple of classes in OOo SDK and The Ultimate Blackmagic(TM) - patent pending:

1. Grab odk / source / com / sun / star / lib / loader from OOo’s CVS and add it to integration module.
2. Add unowinreg.dll to Windows Path (if you are on Linux, skip this step).
3. We need to add “officebean” to classpath. Here lies OOoBean, and is optional if you are only using UNO interfaces. Other JARs are correctly listed by UnoInfo. Alter Loader.java and add this after line 205 (after “UnoInfo” call):

   vec.add(new File(fClassesDir, "officebean.jar").toURL());

4. Now, the ugliest part of the evil potion: create a Facade. Using OOoBean directly will lead to some ugly ClassLoader conflicts. I’ve no time to fix this, but the following works:

   public static Container buildOOoBean() {
     return (Container) Loader.getCustomLoader().
       loadClass("com.sun.star.comp.beans.OOoBean").
       newInstance();
   
   }
   public static void showOOoBean(Container oo) {
     Class c = oo.getClass().
       getClassLoader().
       loadClass("com.sun.star.beans.PropertyValue");
   
     Class ca = Array.newInstance(c, 0).getClass();
     Method m = oo.getClass().
      getMethod("loadFromURL", String.class, ca);
   
     m.invoke(oo, "private:factory/swriter", null);
     oo.getClass().
       getMethod("aquireSystemWindow").invoke(oo);
   }

5. Back to the TC, I use “buildOOoBean” in ComponentOpened and “showOOoBean” AFTER the component is shown (does not work otherwise).

This level of indirection is mandatory, because client module’s ClassLoader is different than integration module’s. If I do “OOoBean oo = new OOoBean()”, the declaration and instantiation will try to use the JARs bundled. Since they don’t lie on OOo install folder, the libraries will not be found. If I use “oo = (OOoBean) Loader.getCustomLoader().getClass(”…”).newInstance()”, the “OOoBean” class from declaration will NOT be the same as the class instantiated. If you ever worked with JavaEE 4 and JSF/Struts/etc, you know that same classes from different ClassLoaders throws ClassCastException.

Yes, it is the purest evilness, but works (with some bugs):

OOo works really well with Java, but NetBeans ClassLoader is “self-contained” (i.e. your bundled application must include EVERYTHING you use). This is a very nice architecture, but does not help if you if you need to interface with external applications.