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in n0319 I created a new feature for my product. I did not select any plugins in the wizard because the list looked big. In the editor I added the RCP feature to the includes list. Then I wanted to go and add my app plugins to the product feature. The list was still big. It would have been ok if it was just my plugins to add (their ids are distinct and grouped together) but my app needs help and update which in turn require lucene, tomcat, ui.forms, ... The net effect was that I arrange to have the list of RCP plugins visible and then open the Add... dialog and very carefully go through the list selecting the ones the product needed but were not already in the RCP feature. This took me several tries and quite a long time to get right. some thoughts - When you add a plugin to a feature using the feature editor Plugins page > Add... it may be useful to have the option to trim out plugins that are already listed (transitively) in the feature. This would have narrowed the list but would still be problematic when defining features low down in a non-trivial feature structure - Have an "add required plugins" function similar to other places (option for fragments). That way users can just add their top level plguin(s) and click the button. plugins already listed in other required/included features would be removed from the current feature - take the list of plugins from a launch configuration and remove plugins already listed in required/included features
*** Bug 138293 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Is any thought being done regarding this bug? I especially care about the 2nd bullet regarding adding plugins automatically. See also http://www.eclipsezone.com/eclipse/forums/t106810.html. This is one of the reasons why my RCP application is still plugin-based instead of feature based. Eclipse already knows which plugins I need for my application to run, so why can't it update my feature with all of those plugins for me?
As far as I know, no one is working on this problem. Contributions are always welcome :)
*** Bug 408552 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Created attachment 237332 [details] "Add Required Plugins" and "Duplicates" buttons I have added 2 buttons to the plug-ins tab in the fragment editor, which I believe solve most of the initial problem: - "Add Required Plugins", with possible optional dependencies resolution; - "Duplicates", which computes plug-ins added multiple times. Both take into account the included features contents and present a selection list to the user. Please, tell me if the patch requires changes.
I don't think there are any committers who have time to review this currently. I will mark it for 4.4 in case someone can spare the time.
Tried out the patch, I like the concept, but had some issues. 1) Duplicate detection only found the first duplicate. I had org.eclipse.sdk as a dependent feature, then added api tools and debug core to the plug-ins. When I press duplicates, it returns me a list with only api tools. If I select that and remove it, then press duplicates again, it then finds debug core. 2) Add required plug-ins provides duplicates Same setup as (1). Pressing add required lists a large number of plug-ins. These plug-ins can immediately be removed as duplicates. 3) Performance This isn't caused by the patch as similar behaviour happens for the Add... button, but it is an issue. When adding a large number of plug-ins, Eclipse hangs while doing some calculation (version number maybe?). 4) Update documentation Help doc doesn't need to be done until these changes are accepted, but this is a reminder that the screenshots and text in the help doc will have to be updated for this change. 5) Copyrights Copyrights at the top of all edited files will have to be updated UI and minor issues: a) Rename "Add required plug-ins" to "Add Required..." The ellipsis should be on as it opens a new dialog. The text length increases the button width too much. b) Add required acts differently than others, opening a dialog vs immediately adding required plug-ins to the list. How often is a user actually going to go through the dependencies and pick and choose? Similarly, the product editor has a checkbox underneath the table called "Include optional dependencies when computing required plug-ins". That is probably too long for the feature editor, but always prompting the user with a dialog is annoying. c) "Select the dependencies to be added:" should be renamed to "Select the required plug-ins to add:" d) Rename "Duplicates..." to "Remove Duplicates..." or "Find Duplicates...". Unless this causes the button width to be too large. e) When there are no plug-ins, the add required button should be disabled. Same for duplicates. f) Perhaps the selection list dialog should have everything selected by default g) Cancelling the dialog asking about option dependencies using the X causes the operation to continue.
This bug hasn't had any activity in quite some time. Maybe the problem got resolved, was a duplicate of something else, or became less pressing for some reason - or maybe it's still relevant but just hasn't been looked at yet. If you have further information on the current state of the bug, please add it. The information can be, for example, that the problem still occurs, that you still want the feature, that more information is needed, or that the bug is (for whatever reason) no longer relevant. -- The automated Eclipse Genie.
This bug is marked as stale for some time. If it is still relevant for the current release, please reopen and remove the stalebug whiteboard tag.
