Next enhancements

[lawson89]

Just a couple more thoughts I had before I forget.

1. As we discussed it would be nice to have a central source of truth for the markup that any extra tools could access (like the previewer)
2. Separate dtd code from UILoader
3. What about a plugin system to be able to plug in additional widget sets?
4. I'd like for the autocomplete to narrow as you type and also be able to show an example (I can work on this now)
5. Documentation for how Sierra does component construction and then property setting - especially for non-primitives

Anyway - I'm happy to work on any of these but of course you should set the priority and direction. I'll make sure I use Java21 style code next time!

[gk-brown]

1. As we discussed it would be nice to have a central source of truth for the markup that any extra tools could access (like the previewer)

For now, I think this should continue to be the README. The list of custom attributes is small and the rest come from the bean properties.

2. Separate dtd code from UILoader

I will work on this next.

3. What about a plugin system to be able to plug in additional widget sets?

Do you mean something like SWT? If so, I would consider that out of scope.

4. I'd like for the autocomplete to narrow as you type and also be able to show an example (I can work on this now)

Sounds good.

5. Documentation for how Sierra does component construction and then property setting - especially for non-primitives

Component construction is handled by the supplier passed to bind(). Property setting is handled by BeanAdapter, which is documented in the Kilo README. The Sierra README covers how non-primitives are handled. Does that help?

[lawson89]

On plugins I'm thinking more of how do I integrate additional widgets without needing to modify the core library? Like if I want to use JGoodies or similar?

[gk-brown]

You can use bind() for that. For example, this code associates the "chart-panel" tag with JFreeChart's ChartPanel class:

UILoader.bind("chart-panel", ChartPanel.class, () -> new ChartPanel(null));

[lawson89]

Oh right! Ok yeah so maybe I'll just add an example to the readme of how to bind other widgets

[gk-brown]

On the v3.5-dtd-encoder branch, I moved DTDEncoder to a separate project called sierra-tools. I also added an enum to UILoader that represents the custom attributes:

Sierra/sierra/src/main/java/org/httprpc/sierra/UILoader.java

Line 91 in fb19f42

public enum Attribute {

This may provide the "single source of truth" you were looking for?

[lawson89]

Ok great - I opened a PR to master for the narrowing of autocomplete options as the user types. Please review and suggest any changes. Once this is merged then I'll open a new PR for the move to sierra-tools

[lawson89]

Ok opened PR for move. Once that's merged I'll incorporate the changes you made to UILoader.

[gk-brown]

Merged. Any objection to changing the package name to org.httprpc.sierra.tools?

[lawson89]

None at all

[lawson89]

I can make that change when I pull in the UILoader changes if you want?

[gk-brown]

@lawson89 Are you actively using Eclipse? If not, we could probably get rid of these additions that came in with your recent merge:

Sierra/.gitignore

Line 5 in a314fab

# Eclipse specific #

[lawson89]

Yes I'm a dinosaur :)

[gk-brown]

OK, no problem!

[lawson89]

Hey - how do you want to handle the release of the preview app? I think an uber-jar is nice even if users have to build themselves. May be nice to have as a release artifact?

[gk-brown]

Gradle generates executable artifacts that we can post with the release. I was planning to do the same for the DTD encoder.

Another option is to use jpackage but I think that could wait for a later release.

[lawson89]

Ok sounds good, I mainly use maven so not familiar with what comes out of the box w gradle

[gk-brown]

I added some basic README content for the DTD encoder and previewer apps. Let me know what you think.

I need to do a little more testing, but otherwise I think the release is nearly ready to go. Is there anything else you were planning to add?

[gk-brown]

OK to remove this line?

Sierra/sierra-tools/previewer/src/main/java/org/httprpc/sierra/tools/previewer/engine/RenderingEngine.java

Line 57 in 0153f7d

System.out.println("Data saved for rendering to file: " + savePath.toAbsolutePath());

[lawson89]

Yep! I'll have a PR in 30 min and I'll make sure I have that removed

[lawson89]

Ok PR up - please check me on how the Sierra attributes are handled in autocomplete.
SierraXMLCompletionProvider.addCommonAttributes

Thanks!

[gk-brown]

All set - I merged the PR and fixed a couple other places where we could use var.

Anything else you want to add or change before we publish the release?

[lawson89]

Nope all good!