Overview

By now, in this sample plug-in, it already can show:

1) a Expeditor launch item;

2) a custom perspective with custom views and Symphony views;

3) some new Symphony documents of three kinds repeatedly;

4) a status bar to show the new documents’ type;

5) a custom engine of spell check;

6) a early startup when Symphony was startup.

7) a custom help document

The following figure shows this sample plug-in's overview image.

Figure 5.5.1 overview image

Introduction to the scenario

On the Expeditor platform and the Symphony developing environment, user maybe need custom views and Symphony views at same time, maybe need use custom view to operate Symphony view, maybe need other typical application of Eclipse and Expeditor such as status bar, early startup, custom spell check, custom help document etc.

Preview of the result

According to the scenario above, this plug-in first create a perspective, and then add 3 views on this perspective. One used for new buttons which create 3 kinds of new Symphony document, the other one used to show description and another used to show multi Symphony document views. Then add early startup which invoked when Symphony was startup, a status bar and a sample help.

Value to the developer

Showing developer:

How to use Expeditor launch item;

How to create a custom perspective and add custom views and Symphony views;

How to create new Symphony documents of three kinds repeatedly;

How to add a status bar to show the new documents’ type;

How to create a custom engine of spell check;

How to add custom early startup when Symphony was startup.

How to add a custom help document

Prepare development environment

Please refer to this guide chapter 1 part 3: Setting up the integrated development environment. It shows how to prepare your symphony develop environment step by step.

Deploying the sample

By now, for developer, if you got this plug-in and do a quick view of this plug-in's functions, just import this sample plug-in into eclipse from a exit project using eclipse import function. Otherwise the following sections show you how to build this plug-in.

Figure 5.5.2 Import this sample plug-in

Figure 5.5.3 Select this sample zip file

Design overview

By now, there are five goals:

1) Open a custom perspective from launch item;

2) Add two custom views and multi-Symphony view;

3) Add a status bar show new file’s type.

4) Add a early startup;

5) Add custom help content.

Step by Step tutorial information to create the sample

Create a new plug-in

1) Launch the Eclipse development environment

2) Click File > New > Project

3) Select “Plug-in Project”, and click “Next”

4) Type com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing in the Project name field. Click Next.

5) Type a descriptive name in the Plug-in Name field, e.g. Customizing sample.

6) Click Finish.

Figure 5.5.4 New project last step image

Add the plug-in dependency

The following table lists some of the plug-in dependencies used by Document Library (plug-in names are abbreviated):

Plug-in	Description
org.eclipse.core.runtime, org.eclipse.ui	Eclipse core plug-ins
com.ibm.productivity.tools.ui.views com.ibm.productivity.tools.core	Lotus Symphony API plug-in
com.ibm.rcp.textanalyzer	RCP user interface APIs

Perform the following steps to add the plug-in dependency.

1) Click the Dependencies tab of the spreadsheet sample plug-in manifest.

2) Click Add.

3) Add the following plug-ins:

· com.ibm.productivity.tools.ui.views

· com.ibm.productivity.tools.core

· com.ibm.rcp.textanalyzer

Figure 5.5.5. Dependencies plug-ins image

Contribute to perspective and views

1) Click the Extensions tab.

2) Click Add.

3) Add the following extension: org.eclipse.ui.perspectives.

4) Click Finish.

5) Right click the added extension and select New > perspective.

6) Click the plugin.xml tab.

7) Copy and paste over with the following into the plugin.xml for a quick finish.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<?eclipse version="3.2"?>

<extension

point="com.ibm.rcp.ui.launcherSet">

<LauncherSet

id="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.views.LauncherSet"

label="Show Customizing Sample">

<perspectiveLaunchItem

autoStart="false"

iconUrl="resource/Customizing.gif"

id="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.views.perspectiveLaunchItem"

label="Show Customizing Sample"

perspectiveId="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.perspective">

</perspectiveLaunchItem>

</LauncherSet>

</extension>

<extension

point="org.eclipse.ui.perspectives">

<perspective

class = "com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.Prespective"

icon="resource/Customizing.gif"

name = "customizing"

id = "com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.perspective"

</extension>

<extension

point="org.eclipse.ui.views">

<view

category="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing"

allowMultiple="true"

class="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.view.WriterView"

id="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.writerview"

icon="resource/Customizing.gif"

name="Document">

</view>

<view

category="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing"

allowMultiple="true"

class="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.view.SpreadsheetView"

id="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.spreadsheetview"

icon="resource/Customizing.gif"

name="Spreadsheet">

</view>

<view

category="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing"

allowMultiple="true"

class="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.view.PresentationView"

id="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.presentationview"

icon="resource/Customizing.gif"

name="Presentation">

</view>

<view

category="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing"

allowMultiple="true"

class="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.view.OpenFilesView"

id="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.openfilesview"

icon="resource/Openfiles.gif"

name="New Files">

</view>

<view

category="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing"

allowMultiple="true"

class="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.view.DescriptionView"

id="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.descriptionview"

icon="resource/Openfiles.gif"

name="Description">

</view>

<category

id="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing"

name="customizing Category">

</category>

</extension>

<extension

point="com.ibm.rcp.ui.controlSets">

<controlSet

visible="true"

id="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.controlset">

<statusLine

path="BEGIN_GROUP"

id="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.statusline">

</statusLine>

<control

statusLinePath="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.statusline/additions"

class="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.StatusbarItem" id="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.control"/>

</controlSet>

</extension>

<extension

point="com.ibm.rcp.textanalyzer.Engines">

<engine

class="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.engine.Engine"

interface="com.ibm.rcp.textanalyzer.spellchecker.SpellCheckerEngine"

locales="en-US,zh-CN"

name="CustomizingEngine"

platform="All"

provider="IBM"

thirdParty="false"/>

</extension>

</extension>

</extension>

</plugin>

Figure 5.5.6 Extensions overview image

8) New a class named Prespective which implements IPerspectiveFactory. The main method in this class as follow;

public void createInitialLayout( IPageLayout layout ) {

//set editor area to invisible so that the view shows maximized.

layout.setEditorAreaVisible(false);

//add the expeditor view to this perspective

layout.addView(OpenFilesView.VIEW_ID, IPageLayout.LEFT, 0.25f, layout.getEditorArea());

layout.addView(DescriptionView.VIEW_ID, IPageLayout.BOTTOM, 0.4f, OpenFilesView.VIEW_ID);

layout.addView(WriterView.VIEW_ID, IPageLayout.RIGHT, 0.75f, layout.getEditorArea());

}

The method createInitialLayout () specified the views layout on the page.

Figure 5.5.7 Sample package explorer

Core code demo

Following is core code snippet for the function, for details, refer to this sample code.

1) Add a launch item to launch a perspective.

First add extension point (com.ibm.rcp.ui.launcherSet), then new a perspectiveLaunchItem and set this item’s perspectiveId attribute value as the perspective’s id which will be launched.

2) Add custom view and Symphony views.

For custom view please refer Eclipse’s org.eclipse.ui.views extension point reference. For Symphony views please refer to section 2.3 chapter 2 part 5 of this guide.

3) Add a status bar

Please refer to section 2.6 chapter 2 part 3 of this guide.

4) Add a custom early startup.

First add extension point (org.eclipse.ui.startup), then new a class implements IStartup to do something when symphony startup.

<startup

class="com.ibm.productivity.tools.samples.customizing.Startup"/>

</extension>

5) Add a custom help context:

First add extension point (org.eclipse.help.toc), then specified the toc file which context pointing to the custom help file.

</extension>

In the toc file, pointing to the help file’s position. For details, please refer this sample.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<?NLS TYPE="org.eclipse.help.toc"?>

<topic

label="Customizing Sample Topic" href="help/help.htm">

</topic>

</toc>

Extending the sample

When next, add a custom dictionary for spell check , activities which are assigned a name and description that provide information about an activity and etc.