Yes, I've been meaning to reply back to this thread. Thanks for reminding
me, Brian! :-)
Our plans for the next release of the Google Plugin for Eclipse (1.3)
include 4 changes designed to make integration with Maven and J2EE projects
easier:
1. The WAR directory can now be configured to be *any* project-relative
path (e.g. src/main/webapp if you're using Maven). You'll also be able
to specify whether that directory is source-only (typical Maven/J2EE
scenario), or whether it should also function as the WAR output directory
from which to run/debug or deploy to App Engine. If your WAR directory is
input *and* output (which will remain the default for new Web App
projects), the plugin will manage synchronizing the contents of WEB-INF/lib
WEB-INF/classes with your project's build path and compiled output.
Otherwise, we'll leave your WAR source directory alone and you'll need to
specify your WAR output location when launching, deploying, etc (the plugin
will remember the location once you set it the first time).
2. The Web App launch configuration UI is being redesigned to allow you
to see, and if necessary change, *any* of the launch arguments.
Previously, we were waiting until launch time to set many of these
arguments based on heuristics that were invisible and inaccessible to you.
Now you'll be in full control of how your projects get launched. Also,
we're adding the capability to automatically migrate your launch
configurations when necessary, for example, updating the -javaagent flag
when changing App Engine SDKs.
3. GWT/App Engine projects will no longer require our SDK library on the
classpath. This means Maven users will be able to pull in JAR files from
their M2 repository as they're accustomed to and the plugin won't mind a
bit.
4. The severity of any problem marker generated by the plugin will be
fully customizable via an Errors/Warnings preference page (similar to the
Java Errors/Warnings page), letting you specify either Error, Warning, or
Ignore.
We'll also be including a few smaller features and bug fixes as well.
What does everyone think about the 4 changes outlined above? We've been
testing the plugin against various Maven and J2EE configurations to try to
ensure that we've eliminated the most critical roadblocks. However, we're
very interested in also having you folks take it for a spin before the
official release date (slated for next month). We're not quite ready yet,
but stay tuned for a 1.3 preview build to be made available hopefully in a
few weeks. We'll distribute it as a zip file for dropin
installation<http://code.google.com/eclipse/docs/install-from-zip.html>
so
it will come with the standard warnings and caveats (use with a clean
Eclipse install and workspace, use at your risk, etc.). However, it will
hopefully give you a chance to give us any last-minute feedback about our
changes before the final release.
Thanks,
Keith
On Thu, Feb 4, 2010 at 12:55 PM, bkbonner <brian.bon...@paraware.com> wrote:
> Keith, are you going to give the folks who replied to your message
> some sort of thoughts on what you're going to implement and hopefully
> let us try it before you end up releasing the next release of the
> plugin?
>
> Brian
>
> On Jan 13, 11:35 am, Keith Platfoot <kplatf...@google.com> wrote:
> > Hi folks,
> >
> > For the next release of the Google Plugin for Eclipse, we're planning on
> > making a few tweaks to make life easier for Maven users. That's right:
> we've
> > seen the stars on the issue tracker, and have decided it's time to act. I
> > would say, "we feel your pain", but the problem is, we don't. Which is to
> > say, nobody on the plugin team actually uses Maven (everybody around here
> > uses Ant). However, I've been researching Maven to determine exactly what
> > changes we should make to allow it to work more seamlessly with the
> Google
> > Eclipse Plugin. I've read the relevant issues and groups postings, so I
> > think I have a rough idea of what needs to happen. However, before we go
> and
> > make any changes, I wanted to ask for the community's advice. So, here
> are
> > some questions for you.
> >
> > What is the typical workflow of a GWT developer using Maven?
> >
> > I've installed Maven and the gwt-maven-plugin 1.2-SNAPSHOT and managed to
> > create a GWT 2.0 app with the provided archetype. After some tweaking,
> I'm
> > able to GWT compile, debug with Eclipse (though not via our Web App
> launch
> > configuration), create a WAR, etc. However, I'm more interested in how
> you all
> > are doing things. For example:
> >
> > How do you...
> >
> > - Create a new project?
> > - Perform GWT compiles?
> > - Debug with Eclipse?
> > - Run your tests?
> > - Create a WAR for deployment?
> >
> > What specific pain points do Maven users run into when using the Google
> > plugin?
> >
> > I know one major obstacle is that our plugin currently treats the war
> > directory as both an input (e.g. static resources, WEB-INF/lib,
> > WEB-INF/web.xml) and output (WEB-INF/classes, GWT artifacts like
> nocache.js
> > and hosted.html) . Maven convention, however, says that /src/main/webapp
> > should be input only, which means that hosted mode (or development mode,
> in
> > GWT 2.0) needs to run from a staging directory (e.g. gwt:run creates a
> /war
> > folder on demand). This mismatch results in the plugin creating spurious
> > validation errors and breaks our Web App launch configuration.
> >
> > Another incompatibility is that Maven projects depend on the GWT Jars in
> the
> > Maven repo, whereas our plugin expects to always find a GWT SDK library
> on
> > the classpath.
> >
> > Are my descriptions of these pain points accurate? If so, one possible
> > solution would be for the plugin to allow the definition of an input war
> > directory (e.g. src/main/webapp) separate from a launch-time staging
> > directory, and for us to relax the requirement that all GWT projects must
> > have a GWT SDK library. So tell me: would these changes adequately
> reduce
> > the friction between Maven and the Google plugin?
> >
> > Also, are there other problems Maven users are running into when using
> the
> > plugin?
> >
> > Thanks in advance for all feedback,
> >
> > Keith, on behalf of the Google Plugin for Eclipse team
>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
> "Google Web Toolkit" group.
> To post to this group, send email to google-web-tool...@googlegroups.com.
> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to
> google-web-toolkit+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com<google-web-toolkit%2bunsubscr...@googlegroups.com>
> .
> For more options, visit this group at
> http://groups.google.com/group/google-web-toolkit?hl=en.
>
>
--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
"Google Web Toolkit" group.
To post to this group, send email to google-web-tool...@googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to
google-web-toolkit+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit this group at
http://groups.google.com/group/google-web-toolkit?hl=en.
