Eclipse 3.2 M4 - New and Noteworthy

Here are some of the more noteworthy things available in milestone build M4 (December 16, 2005) which is now available for download. See the M4 build notes for details about bugs fixed and other changes.

Platform UI

Just in time for Christmas...all the draggable trimmings

The window 'trim' (i.e., Status Line, Heap Status, Fast View Bar...) can now be repositioned around the workbench window. Each trim element has its own grab handle which you can either click and drag to move the trim or right-click to get a context menu.

Problems View filters use Window Working Set by default

Problems View filters are tied to the Window Working Set by default when they are created. The user does not have to update the Problems view when they set up their working sets if default settings are used. If there are no working sets, the filter is applied to all elements.

Filtering in Import, Export, and New wizards

The Import, Export, and New wizards now provide filtering of wizards that appear in the list based on text provided by the user. This is the same feature that already exists in the Preferences and Show View dialogs.

JFace field assistance

JFace introduces new support for assisting the user in completing fields inside dialogs and forms. The org.eclipse.jface.fieldassist package provides classes that let you decorate arbitrary controls with images and corresponding hover text. These can be used for purposes such as marking required fields in a dialog, showing field-based error conditions, or showing content-assist prompts. The package also allows you to install content proposals on a control, including a popup dialog with content proposals, secondary popups for further information, and options for invoking proposals explicitly or in an automatic (type-ahead) style. Try it out and get your requests in before the M5 API freeze!

User Assistance

Support for dynamic Help content

Help system now supports dynamic composition of help content. Topics authored in XHMTL can contain additional Eclipse-specific markup for on-the-fly filtering of content based on os/ws/arch values, presence of plug-ins, enabled capabilities, etc. Shared content can be included into multiple documents. Finally, plug-ins can contribute XHTML fragments that plug into anchors in other documents. All this now enables information developers to provide dynamic documents that tailor themselves to the context at the time of viewing.

You can read more about XHTML content support in the Dynamic Content document.

Search enhancements

User assistance indexing and searching has been enhanced in various ways. Additional search participants can be registered via extension point that can add content to the Lucene index. Help now contributes an XHTML search participant that can index dynamic help documents authored in XHMTL (see above). In addition, documents that were previously not in the index will now appear (e.g. cheat sheets and Welcome pages). Search hits can now have different icons and the 'open' action can be delegated to the search engine.

You can read more about the enhancements in the UA search enhancements proposal.

SWT

HSB color support

A color can be created by specifying the hue, saturation, and brightness. In addition, for a given color, the hue, saturation, and brightness values can be queried.

For an example, see the SWT snippet

StyledText alignment, indentation, justification

StyledText now supports indenting, justifying and aligning text.

For an example, see the SWT snippet

Embedded objects in StyledText

StyledText now allows you to embed objects such as images or widgets inside the text. Objects wrap with the text.

For an example, see the SWT snippet

Background image

A background image can be set into a control. In addition, the background can be inherited by child widgets such as labels.

For an example, see the SWT snippet

Native image loading

The constructor Image(Device device, String filename) will now load images using native operating system calls. This has improved performance of image loading and increased the maximum size of image that can be loaded.

Dragging text

If the SWT.DragDetect event is hooked on Text or StyledText, the selection will not be cleared when the user drags from within a selected range of text. This makes it possible to support dragging from the Text and StyledText widgets.

For an example, see this SWT snippet

Team/CVS

CVS Update options

In M3, CVS added the capability to perform client side merges on a Team > Update. In M4, this has been enhanced to allow you to configure when the update is shown in a dialog. You may choose to preview the entire merge or only be prompted if there are conflicts to be resolved.

Model content in CVS Update dialog

When the "Perform client side merges on update" work-in-progress preference is enabled and a merge dialog is shown, the dialog will show the effects of the update in terms of the models involved in the operation (for those models that provide the appropriate support).

Generic File History view

A new generic history view has been added. The view is not hooked up to the CVS Show History menu action yet. It can be opened using Window>Show View>Other>Team>File History View and can be populated using drag & drop or Link with Editor. The purpose of this view in M4 is to preview support that is coming in 3.2 with the expectation that this view will replace the CVS History view, and can be used by other team providers as well.

Expand All in CVS Repositories view

An Expand All menu action has been added to folders in the CVS Repositories view. This action will fetch the entire subtree in a single round trip and expand it in the view.

JDT Core

Support for secondary types

Secondary types (i.e. top-level types defined in a file with a different name than the type) are now found by the reconciler, code assist, etc.

picture of Java perspective with secondary type

Completion on labels

Code completion is now available on labels in break and continue statements.

picture of Java editor completing on a label

CamelCase support in code completion

Code completion now supports CamelCase patterns. For example, completing on "NPE" will propose "NullPointerException". This support can be enabled or disabled using the Java > Editor > Content Assist > Match CamelCase proposals preference.

picture of Java editor completing on NPE

Support for Java-like extensions

Files with a file extension other than '.java' and containing pure Java code are now supported. Adding a Java-like extension is done using the General > Content Types > Text > Java Source File preference.

picture of Java perspective with Y.abc compilation unit

Resources

Linked resources anywhere

You can now create linked resources at any depth within your projects. This allows you to put resources from different places in the file system anywhere you like in the project structure, including below other linked resources.

JDT UI

Clean Up wizard

The Code Clean Up wizard has been extended with the following new options:

Remove unused private field
Remove unused local variable
Convert for loops to enhanced for loops
Convert control statement body to block
Qualify access to static field with declaring class
Change indirect access to static member to direct access

Select a project, package, or file and start Source > Clean Up... to start this wizard.

Surround-with template

The existing Surround With Quick Fix is now aware of variables that need to be pulled out or made final. Select the lines to surround (full line selection required!) and press Ctrl+1 to see all templates.

Surround with runnable code transformation

Note that you can add your custom 'surround-with' templates on the Java > Editor > Templates page. All the template needs is a ${line_selection} variable.

Content Assist remembers right hand sides

Content assist (Ctrl+Space on most platforms) remembers the types most recently used in similar situations. For example, if you always assign ArrayList instances to List variables, the ArrayList proposal will rank higher than other type proposals. Also, the remembered types will be shown even if there is no prefix.

Screenshot: Invoking content assist to assign a List variable shows proposals for the most recently used List implementations

Rename Type updates similarly named elements

The Rename Type refactoring has been extended to rename variables and methods with names similar to the renamed type. Name matching can be configured with a new option dialog. There is also a new preview page which shows all affected elements.

Update Similar Declarations UI

Delete Package is now hierarchical

Deleting a package now automatically removes empty parent packages. A new option in the delete confirmation dialog allows deleting subpackages as well.

Hierarchical Package Delete

Refactoring-aware JAR File Import/Export

The current refactoring tools of JDT have been extended to support applying refactorings across different workspaces.

Refactoring information can now be exported using the JAR Export Wizard. This feature can be enabled on the first page of the JAR Export Wizard by checking the option Annotate JAR file with refactoring information.

JAR Export Wizard

A corresponding JAR Import Wizard is available as well, guiding the user through the process of updating an existing version of a JAR file with a new one, executing all refactorings performed between the two versions of a JAR library.

This works for the following refactorings:

Rename Package, Type, Method, and Field
Move Method
Change Method Signature

Javadoc view and tool tips from attached Javadoc

The Javadoc view and the Javadoc hovers now extract the information from the attached Javadoc for libraries that do not have source attached.

Java Outline view and Quick Outline for Java files that aren't in the workspace

The Java Outline page and the Quick Outline can now show the outline for external Java files and Java files from repositories.

Smart caret positioning in dialogs showing Java names

Text fields for editing Java names now support smart caret positioning as you know it from the Java editor.

Ctrl+Left and Ctrl+Right now stop at camel case boundaries inside a name. Their shifted equivalents extend the selection in small steps, and Ctrl+Delete / Ctrl+Backspace delete the next / previous part of a name.


Ctrl+Right:
Ctrl+Shift+Right:
write "Equal":
Ctrl+Delete:
write "To":

Quick fixes for annotations

New quick fixes have been added to deal with Java 1.5 annotations:

Add a missing annotation attribute
Add a new annotation member

Platform Runtime

Runtime refactoring

In order to make the Eclipse runtime more flexible and allow independent use of runtime components, the org.eclipse.core.runtime plug-in has been split into several plug-ins:

org.eclipse.equinox.common – common code used by more than one piece of the former runtime plug-in (i.e. IPath, IStatus, IProgressMonitor).
org.eclipse.equinox.registry - Extension registry
org.eclipse.equinox.preferences - Preferences mechanism
org.eclipse.core.jobs - Jobs mechanism
org.eclipse.core.contenttype - Content mechanism
org.eclipse.equinox.supplement - A supplemental "plug-in" that is used to support running without OSGi.

New APIs were added to facilitate control of the split runtime pieces. Those APIs are likely to evolve during this iteration.

The runtime refactoring should be transparent to other plug-ins. For more details, visit the Equinox migration page.

Debug

Execution environments

You can now specify a JRE to use for running, debugging and building based on execution environment. An execution environment describes the capabilities of a Java runtime - for example, J2SE-1.4. The new Execution Environments preference page displays the JREs installed in your workspace compatible with each execution environment. JREs that meet the exact requirements of an execution environment are displayed in bold, and JREs that surpass the requirements of an environment are displayed in the default font. When more than one JRE is compatible with an execution environment, you can select a default JRE to use for that environment by checking it.

A build path or launch configuration that references an execution environment is more portable than one that references an explicit JRE as a JRE's execution environment can be resolved independently of its name. Use the JRE tab or Edit Library wizard to specify an execution environment for running and building.

PDE

Bundle execution environment

A bundle execution environment specifies the minimum level of JRE required for the plug-in to run. If the JRE used to run Eclipse does not meet the requirement, the plug-in will not run.

If you declare J2SE-1.4 as your plug-in's bundle execution environment, for example, your plug-in will run with a JRE version >= 1.4.

If the plug-in can run in execution environments that are not proper subsets of each other (e.g J2SE-1.4 and CDC-1.1/Foundation-1.1), then all such bundle execution environments should be listed.

The Execution Environments section is on the Overview page of the plug-in manifest editor.

Refer to the Java > Installed JREs > Execution Environments preference page for a list of OSGi execution environments and the list of installed JREs that are compatible with each.

Compile a plug-in against your favorite JRE during export

When exporting a plug-in, you now have the ability to compile the plug-in against the JRE of choice by specifying a build execution environment in the build.properties editor. The JRE that the plug-in will compile against will be the one associated with that execution environment on the Java > Installed JREs > Execution Environments preference page. Compiler compliance settings will also be deduced from the selected execution environment.

New extension point schema editor

The extension point schema editor has been redesigned. New features include:

better visualization of the schema
simpler editing of attributes
drag and drop
inclusion of other schemas

Form validation in product editor

The product editor now reports warnings and errors in the title area of each page. Problems reported include invalid paths and the wrong size and depth of an image.

Platform-specific launcher arguments for cross-platform product export

In the product editor, it is now possible to specify platform-specific program and VM arguments to launch a product with. This allows the creation of platform-specific <launcher>.ini files in a single cross-platform export operation.

Structural compare and syntax highlighting for manifest.mf files

When comparing two versions of a bundle manifest.mf file, the new structure compare viewer will let you easily see what headers have been added, removed or modified.

Syntax highlighting has also been added to the manifest.mf source page. Colors and fonts preferences can be set on the Plug-in Development > Editors preference page.

Templates for launching arguments

You can now specify a template for program and VM arguments, which will be used to initialize default arguments on new PDE launch configurations.

Update

Install/Update enhancements

Install/Update now supports multiple selections for most Update operations in the Manage Configuration window (disable, uninstall, enable). In addition, the uninstall operation can now be performed on currently enabled features. Update will disable them, restart Eclipse, and perform the actual uninstall on the way back up.

The above features are just the ones that are new since the previous milestone build. Summaries for earlier 3.2 milestone builds: