CODEWITHSUNDEEP
eclipse-plugin
Paweł Kłeczek
Paweł Kłeczek

Reputation: 643

Eclipse: Project nature benefits, reading project & plugins settings

So far I have two short questions:
1) What precisely are the benefits of creating custom nature?
2) Is it possible to somehow programmatically read files in [project]/.setting or [workspace]/.metadata/.plugins?
I'm using Eclipse Helios (3.6).

Ad 1. I've read that you can't have two natures ofthe same set, that you can use it to associate certain perspectives/tools (ex. builder) with it but well.. anyting else I can't do easily without nature? Ex. I can easily add a builder by modifying an IProject variable.

Ad 2. I tried to find a way to read project specific settings or plugin settings but failed. No specs, different file types, inconsistent XML tags... Is it at all possible without parsing them manually?

Thanks for your help!
Paweł

Upvotes: 0

Views: 828

Answers (1)

Konstantin Komissarchik
Konstantin Komissarchik

Reputation: 29139

Think of a nature as a flag. All project-related functionality in Eclipse is triggered by natures. Project properties pages, context menu items, etc. appear based on presence of natures. Third parties can check for presence of nature to tell if the project is of certain "type". A nature also has install/uninstall methods. This gives you a convenient place to implement all actions that need to happen on the project when your technology is enabled. Why is that convenient? Because a third party can simply add the nature without knowing what else is necessary to configure and your code takes care of the rest.

Plugins write to [project]/.setting or [workspace]/.metadata/.plugins locations in different ways. The file formats are never documented as they aren't meant to be manipulated directly. Some plugins re-use the common ProjectScope and InstanceScope classes to read/write the data. Some read/write on their own. I would start with what information you are trying to read, figure out which plugin it belongs to and then see if there is public API in that plugin for accessing that information. Reading these settings directly is almost never going to be the correct approach.

Upvotes: 2

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