Hi all,
I'd like to second Phillip's position. I think that a menu-based instead
of frame-based method of selecting projects would be much more effective.
The fact that one may have shared source files between projects - plus the
usual problem of debugging third-party libraries source code - is a very
good argument for "sticky" projects. And the method used for changing a
project should not depend on the windowing capabilities of the display -
much less force the user to open another frame if he/she don't want to.
Regards,
Nascif A.A. Neto
Nortel Networks
Phillip Lord wrote:
> >>>>> "Paul" == Paul Kinnucan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>
> Paul> I am thinking of revising the way projects work in the JDE to
> Paul> put each project in its own frame.
>
> I have to put state my claim here right at the begining. For
> a while I have no used the project system, to the extend that I use
> this function...
>
> (defun jde-load-project-file())
>
> (which does precisely nothing) instead of the standard one.
> When I did use the "project system" I subverted it by placing a "load
> file" option in a menu item that I call "Jde+" which has all those
> features that I like specifically.
>
> It strikes me that the major problem with the project system
> is that it stores ALL of the JDE variables in the project file. For me
> this is a pain because I have a whole series of functions which alter
> JDE variables, to allow for instance toggling between javac, and
> jikes, whether I run java with or without JIT and so on. These all get
> overridden by the project system, when often all I want to do is to
> over-ride for instance the javac -d directory, and classpath, or to
> switch compilers so that I can check code is 1.0, 1.1 or 1.2
> compliant. The fact that standard options such as for instance the
> boiler plate text, gets stored in many places is for me enough of a
> pain that Ive just removed it from my version of JDE (oh! the joys of
> open source!). It would seem likely to me that fixing this problem
> would probably work around the other problems that Paul is talking
> off. Maybe Im being nieve here, but I keep all of my source code
> arrayed from one root directory. Doesnt everyone?
>
> Im aware that fixing this is a large scale coding option. If
> instead the small scale option is desired, I think I would be inclined
> to provide two options rather than the straight forward way Paul has
> suggested. Personally I would dislike having more than two frames open
> (it took me ages to get used to speedbar because of this) for any
> reasons yet alone different projects. It should I think be possible to
> instead of doing this strictly frame based mechanism to have it menu
> based (menu's are available from emacs thru vt100 right?). You would
> have a basic menu called for instance "JDE project" with two menu
> items "Project Open", and "Set Frame to Project" (oops this is not a
> neat name..Im sure someone can come up with something better). On
> opening a new project (with "Project open" which would give you the
> minibuffer "find file" dialog, or equivalent function for xemacs if it
> is different, which would allow you to load a whatever it is the
> prj.el file has been called) you would get a new menu item named after
> the project name. If you then called "Set Frame to project", this
> would alter the name of the current frame to the project and any
> buffer opened in this frame would get this project. For luddites like
> myself who like one frame only or who have text only frames, you would
> be in a nice position to switch Projects manually, which is what I
> have been doing for ages anyway. It would be easy to tell which system
> you were using depending on the title bar of the frame, which would be
> a project name, or "Emacs", although here things might get hairy if
> you opened speedbar half way though (Paul:- does speedbar reset the
> title bar to the file name each time you change buffer? Have you
> considered the effect this would have on the frame title bar? This
> could be disconcerting!). This would only be ambiguous if you were on
> a vt100, in which case you would set projects by hand anyway.
>
> If you really wanted to get complex you could have
> "Set Project by source location" option as well, which sets everything
> back to current mechanism, which would satisfy everyone. Although
> probably confuse the hell out of new users. The latter is of course a
> problem, although I would say that in my brief foray out of emacs-land
> into the dodgy no mans lands of "IDE's which arnt JDE" I have yet to
> find a "project" system in any of the IDE's which didnt confuse the
> hell out of me, so JDE would just be getting into line here.
>
> Phil
>
>
