NetBeans 6.1 and trunk compatible Code Template Tools NBMs

NetBeans 6.1 is out!

I have updated the Code Template Tools module to work with NetBeans 6.1 FCS and trunk. Here are the NBMs"

NetBeans 6.1 FCS compatible Code Templates Tools NBM

post 6.1 main compatible Code Templates Tools NBM

I need to figure out how to publish multiple NBMs on Plugin Portal. In the mean time you will have to use these.
 

YouTube Viewer add-on project

In this blog entry I talked about the YouTube Viewer add-on for Firefox. In the last blog I talked about how to use a freeform Web NetBeans 6.1 Project to build the iPhone mode add-on for Firefox. Download a similar freeform Web NetBeans 6.1 Project for YouTube Viewer.

Using NetBeans 6.1 freeform project to build iPhone mode add-on for Firefox project.

In the last entry I talked about an iPhone mode add-on for Firefox. I used a free form Web Project of NetBeans 6.1 IDE to build the iPhone mode add-on. The NetBeans 6.1 IDE has a great JavaScript editor. That was a big plus. Here is a visual tour of the Web Project setup.

The Build Script

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<project name="iPhoneEmulator" default="all" basedir=".">
    <description>iPhone Emulator for Firefox.</description>
    <property name="build.dir" value="build"/>
        <!-- build iphone -->
    <target name="-create-iphone-jar">
        <echo message="Build iphone.jar"/>
        <mkdir dir="${build.dir}"/>
        <zip destfile="${build.dir}/iphone.jar">
            <zipfileset dir="." includes="content/**" />
            <zipfileset dir="." includes="locale/**" />
            <zipfileset dir="." includes="skin/**" />
        </zip>
    </target>
    <target name="-gen-manifest">
        <echo message="Configuring chrome-manifest"/>
        <mkdir dir="${build.dir}"/>
        <copy file="chrome.manifest" tofile="${build.dir}/chrome.manifest" overwrite="true"/>
        <replaceregexp file="${build.dir}/chrome.manifest"
             match="^(content\s+\S*\s+)(\S*/)$"
             replace="\1jar:chrome/iphone.jar!/\2"
             flags="g" byline="true"/>
        <replaceregexp file="${build.dir}/chrome.manifest"
             match="^(skin|locale)(\s+\S*\s+\S*\s+)(.*/)$"
             replace="\1\2jar:chrome/iphone.jar!/\3"
             flags="g" byline="true"/>
    </target>
    <target name="-create-iphone-xpi" depends="-create-iphone-jar,-gen-manifest">
        <echo message="Build iphone.xpi"/>
        <mkdir dir="${build.dir}"/>
        <zip destfile="${build.dir}/iphone.xpi">
            <zipfileset dir="${build.dir}" includes="iphone.jar" prefix="chrome" />
            <zipfileset dir="${build.dir}" includes="chrome.manifest" />
            <zipfileset dir="."            includes="install.rdf" />
        </zip>
    </target>
    <target name="all" depends="-create-iphone-xpi"/>

    <target name="run" depends="clean,all">
        <exec executable="firefox" osfamily="unix">
            <arg file="${build.dir}/iphone.xpi"/>
        </exec>
        <exec executable="/usr/bin/open" osfamily="mac">
            <arg value="-b"/>
            <arg value="org.mozilla.firefox"/>
            <arg file="${build.dir}/iphone.xpi"/>
        </exec>
        <exec executable="C:/Program Files/Mozilla Firefox/firefox.exe" osfamily="windows">
            <arg file="${build.dir}/iphone.xpi"/>
        </exec>
    </target>

    <target name="-clean-iphone">
        <echo message="Clean iphone"/>
        <delete file="${build.dir}/iphone.jar" failonerror="false"/>
        <delete file="${build.dir}/chrome.manifest" failonerror="false"/>
        <delete file="${build.dir}/iphone.xpi" failonerror="false"/>
    </target>
    <target name="clean" depends="-clean-iphone"/>
</project>

Here is the rest:

Projects and Files window showing the layout: 

The NetBeans IDE is slowly starting to take shape as a premium AJAX, Web 2.0 and Mobile development IDE. 

TIP: Displaying rich messages using JOptionPane and JEditorPane

In this and this blog entry I discussed technics to show images and multiline text in tooltips. The same technics can be applied to show rich messages using JEditorPane. Here is an example:

import java.awt.Cursor;
import java.awt.Desktop;
import java.awt.Dialog;
import java.awt.Dimension;
import java.awt.EventQueue;
import java.awt.Window;
import java.awt.event.HierarchyEvent;
import java.awt.event.HierarchyListener;
import java.util.logging.Level;
import java.util.logging.Logger;
import javax.swing.JEditorPane;
import javax.swing.JOptionPane;
import javax.swing.JScrollPane;
import javax.swing.SwingUtilities;
import javax.swing.event.HyperlinkEvent;
import javax.swing.event.HyperlinkListener;

public class NetBeansDay2008 {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        // Turn anti-aliasing on
        System.setProperty("awt.useSystemAAFontSettings", "on");
        final JEditorPane editorPane = new JEditorPane();

        // Enable use of custom set fonts
        editorPane.putClientProperty(JEditorPane.HONOR_DISPLAY_PROPERTIES, Boolean.TRUE);  
        editorPane.setFont(new Font("Arial", Font.BOLD, 13));

        editorPane.setPreferredSize(new Dimension(520,180));
        editorPane.setEditable(false);
        editorPane.setContentType("text/html");
        editorPane.setText(
                "<html>"
                + "<body>"
                + "<table border='0px' cxellpadding='10px' height='100%'>"
                + "<tr>"
                + "<td valign='center'>"
                + "<img src='"
                + "http://www.netbeans.org/images/javaone/2008/nbday08_logo.gif"
                // Alternatively an image stored next to the NetBeansDay2008 
                // class can be used like this.
                //+ NetBeansDay2008.class.getResource("nbday08_logo.gif").toExternalForm()
                + "'>"
                + "</td>"
                + "<td>"
                + "<a href='http://www.netbeans.org/community/articles/javaone/2008/nb-day.html'><b>NetBeans Day</b></a><br>"
                + "San Francisco May 5th, 2008<br>"
                + "<br>"
                + "NetBeans - The only IDE you need!<br>"
                + "</td>"
                + "</tr>"
                + "</table>"
                + "</body>"
                + "</html>"
                );

        // TIP: Make the JOptionPane resizable using the HierarchyListener
        editorPane.addHierarchyListener(new HierarchyListener() {
            public void hierarchyChanged(HierarchyEvent e) {
                Window window = SwingUtilities.getWindowAncestor(editorPane);
                if (window instanceof Dialog) {
                    Dialog dialog = (Dialog)window;
                    if (!dialog.isResizable()) {
                        dialog.setResizable(true);
                    }
                }
            }
        });

        // TIP: Add Hyperlink listener to process hyperlinks
        editorPane.addHyperlinkListener(new HyperlinkListener() {
            public void hyperlinkUpdate(final HyperlinkEvent e) {
                if (e.getEventType() == HyperlinkEvent.EventType.ENTERED) {
                    EventQueue.invokeLater(new Runnable() {
                        public void run() {
                            // TIP: Show hand cursor
                            SwingUtilities.getWindowAncestor(editorPane).setCursor(Cursor.getPredefinedCursor(Cursor.HAND_CURSOR));
                            // TIP: Show URL as the tooltip
                            editorPane.setToolTipText(e.getURL().toExternalForm());
                        }
                    });
                } else if (e.getEventType() == HyperlinkEvent.EventType.EXITED) {
                    EventQueue.invokeLater(new Runnable() {
                        public void run() {
                            // Show default cursor
                            SwingUtilities.getWindowAncestor(editorPane).setCursor(Cursor.getDefaultCursor());

                            // Reset tooltip
                            editorPane.setToolTipText(null);
                        }
                    });
                } else if (e.getEventType() == HyperlinkEvent.EventType.ACTIVATED) {
                    // TIP: Starting with JDK6 you can show the URL in desktop browser
                    if (Desktop.isDesktopSupported()) {
                        try {
                            Desktop.getDesktop().browse(e.getURL().toURI());
                        } catch (Exception ex) {
                            Logger.getLogger(NetBeansDay2008.class.getName()).log(Level.SEVERE, ex.getMessage(), ex);
                        }
                    }
                    //System.out.println("Go to URL: " + e.getURL());
                }
            }
        });
        JOptionPane.showMessageDialog(null,
                new JScrollPane(editorPane),
                "NetBeans Day 2008",
                JOptionPane.PLAIN_MESSAGE);
    }
}

Based on a tip from a reader I have added the code to turn on anti-aliasing and use of custom set fonts in JEditorPane. This shows the following visually pleasing dialog:

See you there!

Remove unused binding attribute from VisualWeb JSF pages

Prior to NetBeans IDE 6.0 release VisualWeb Pages use to generate a binding attribute in the tag for every component in the page.

For example, when a Grid Panel was dropped on Page1, the following tag was automatically generated in the Page1.jsp file:

<h:panelGrid binding="#{Page1.gridPanel1}" id="gridPanel1" style="height: 96px; left: 24px; top: 24px; position: absolute; width: 96px"/>

and the following field, getter and setter was generated in the Page1.java file:

    private HtmlPanelGrid gridPanel1 = new HtmlPanelGrid();

    public HtmlPanelGrid getGridPanel1() {
        return gridPanel1;
    }

    public void setGridPanel1(HtmlPanelGrid hpg) {
        this.gridPanel1 = hpg;
    }

This was good if you wanted to access the gridPane1 component programmatically. Otherwise it only served to bloat the .jsp and .java files. Therefore starting with NetBeans IDE 6.1 (M1+) release we decided to not generate the binding attribute automatically. Instead you can add and remove the binding attribute (and the corresponding field, getter and setter) by invoking the action in the component's pop up menu. For details, see the mini spec - On-demand binding attribute .

All this is well and good for projects developed using the NetBeans 6.1 (M1+) IDE and later. However the projects developed prior to NetBeanse 6.1 (M1+) IDE, do not benefit from this feature. That is where the new module - Remove unused binding attributes from VisualWeb JSF Pages comes for the rescue. This module installs the action - Remove unused binding attributes in the VisualWeb JSF Pages' in the projects pop up menu. When the action is invoked it shows a confirmation dialog:

Once you confirms the action, the unused binding attributes (and the corresponding field, getter and setter in the backing page bean) are removed from all the VisualWeb JSF pages in the VisualWeb project. The output window shows the processing messages. For example:

Removing unused binding attributes for components in the VisualWeb JSF Pages in the Project '/..../NetBeansProjects/WebApplication1'...
Modeling...
Modeling...Done
Processing '.../NetBeansProjects/WebApplication15/web/Page1.jsp'
:
:
:
Removed unused binding attribute for the component 'gridPanel1'.
:
:
:
Processing '.../NetBeansProjects/WebApplication15/web/Page1.jsp' Done

Processing '.../NetBeansProjects/WebApplication15/web/Page2.jsp'
:
:
Processing '.../NetBeansProjects/WebApplication15/web/Page2.jsp' Done
Processing '.../NetBeansProjects/WebApplication15/web/Page3.jsp'
:
:
Processing '.../NetBeansProjects/WebApplication15/web/Page3.jsp' Done
Removing unused binding attributes for components in the VisualWeb JSF Pages in the Project '/.../NetBeansProjects/WebApplication1'...Done 

The process may take some time depending on the number of VisualWeb JSF pages in your project.

Please make sure you have backed up your project before you invoke the action. For best results invoke the action as soon as you open the project. Aftre you have processed all you projects you can remove the module by using Tools:Plugin action.

The module is available on the NetBeans 6.1 Beta Update center:

http://updates.netbeans.org/netbeans/updates/6.1/uc/beta/beta/catalog.xml.gz

You can configure the update center in the Tools:Plugins:Setting tab. NetBeans 6.1 Beta IDE is required to use this module.

Please send us your feedback here.

After processing, your project will become lean and mean, VisualWeb machine :)