Re: [pde-build-dev] Bundle Dependency Question

[Mark_Melvin@xxxxxxxx]

Hi Barrie,

Thanks for the response.  I have replied below:


pde-build-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote on 05/04/2007
06:07:49 PM:

> On 5/3/07, Mark_Melvin@xxxxxxxx <Mark_Melvin@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > <some_folder>/
> >     +--builddir/
> >     |       +--features/
> >     |       |     +--Feature
A/ (this is what I am building)
> >     |       +--plugins/
> >     |
> >     +--dependencies/
> >             +--features/
> >             |     +--Feature
B/
> >             |     +--Feature
C/
> >             +--plugins/
> >                  
+--pluginD_vXXXX.jar
> 
> And looking at your response about why you are doing this...
> 
> The "dependencies" folder is the "eclipseTarget"
directory right? And
> as Pascal points out, requires all transitive dependencies to be
> resolved in order for PDE to work.
> 

I think you mean "baseLocation"?  But
actually, my dependencies folder is meant to correspond with the PDE's
notion of "pluginPath".  It is the same thing, really.  The
dependencies can go in either spot.  It is really just a matter of
getting them on the classpath and available during the build.

> Have a look at http://docs.codehaus.
> org/display/MAVENUSER/Building+Eclipse+RCP+and+RCP-based+Applications
> it is specific to Maven, but since you are using Ivy (which uses the
> Maven repository) you may find some value in switching.
> 

I have looked at these pages before and it all seemed
pretty Maven-specific.  We did an in-depth investigation into using
Maven awhile back and basically decided against it.  Our only Java
code is entirely contained in our Eclipse-related plugins and features,
and we have a lot of "other stuff" to build that is not Java.
 To be frank, Maven didn't fit very well at all and we would be adding
a whole lot of infrastructure overhead for very little benefit (in our
opinion).  We actually did not even want to get into using Ivy, but
the more we got into things it looked like we would be re-inventing a bit
of common stuff that Ivy does.  It is a trade-off of added complexity
versus re-use.  Currently we're fighting to find and understand the
"undocumented features". ;o)

> The setup described across the various pages will allow you to
> automatically populated the "eclipseTarget" directory based
on the
> already declared dependencies in your plugins META-INF/Manifest.mf
> files.
> 
> At the moment it is not a 100% solution for you as the
> maven-eclipse-plugin doesn't understand features at the moment so
it
> can't pull in the right dependencies.
> 
> However I have the same need as you and I am actively working on resolving
it.
> 
> My build is using Maven to invoke the pde ant build process and
> CruiseControl to run this continuously. And because Maven helps with
> the transitive dependencies I don't have the same problems with
> manually specifying everything.
> 

Again, I appreciate the reponse and it would be nice
to get the transitive dependencies automatically.  However, we already
specify them quite explicitly in the manifest.mf and feature.xml files
and it seems relatively easy to re-use this information to create an Ivy.xml
(manually at first), potentially automating the generation of this later
as well.

Mark.
AMI Semiconductor - "Silicon Solutions for the Real World"
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