Is anyone within the sound of my voice using the Wuff plugin for building Eclipse plugins? I’m attempting to use it, but I’m also pretty new to Eclipse plugin development, and the docs on the Wuff github site are somewhat presumptuous.
I inherited a large Eclipse plugin codebase, and I’m attempting to convert the existing build, which uses Maven Tycho, as I discovered that Maven Tycho isn’t able to package Maven dependencies as an OSGi plugin (the original authors apparently ran into this, and they just dumped the required jars into a “lib” folder, which I’m not going to allow to carry forward).
The Wuff doc page that talks about converting an existing app (https://github.com/akhikhl/wuff/wiki/Convert-existing-Eclipse-plugins-and-apps-to-Gradle) seems to assume that the plugin is also inside an Eclipse RCP application, which is not the case here. After following the instructions on the page, the resulting build actually doesn’t do anything. It doesn’t fail, it just doesn’t build anything.
This is mostly moot, as I probably won’t be going in this direction, but is there a way to contact plugin authors besides through email? I sent him two emails over the span of a couple of weeks, and I got nothin’. I also filed an issue or two about my experiences, but I’ve seen no comments.
I can’t say much about the Wuff project, since I did not use it for another reason: Lack of p2 repository support.
If you would be fine with maintaining something yourself, you could use the Buildship build as an inspiration. We have created an Eclipse Plugin build system for ourselves. We also repackage some Maven dependencies as OSGi bundles and publish them in an update site. The whole thing is really tailored to our use case and not ready for general use, which is why we keep it inside the Buildship repo.
Yes, I’m aware of the possibility of using pieces of what BuildShip is doing. Unfortunately I’m very new to Eclipse plugin development.
From what I can see, Wuff is effectively abandonware. I don’t see any participation from the author in his own github project since September of last year.
With no Gradle solution easily available, I’ll be staying with Maven Tycho at this point, assuming the sysadmins I work with are able to mirror MavenCentral jars with a p2 repo.
Sad. Exactly this is what we are missing, because without this, Buildship is very uninteresting for our purposes. Our projects partly produce non-Eclipse serverside stuff, and on the other hand we have a bunch of subprojects producing an Eclipse based client application. And this is what we are expecting from Buildship.
Uh, I’ll jump on this before the Gradle people can. Just so it’s clear, Stefan is referring to the fact that the build infrastructure for Buildship is specifically tailored to building Buildship. He’s not saying that Buildship itself is “tailored to our use case and not ready for general use”.
The support for Gradle projects that build Eclipse-based applications is completely separate from IDE support for Gradle-based projects. I would love to have better support for that, but that is not a Buildship problem (although it seems possible to conceive of eventually having functionality in Buildship that “knows” that the project is building an Eclipse application, and provides further support).
Don’t mistake my frustration with Wuff with some sort of problem with Buildship.
Just got back from presenting an Eclipse/RCP build system at Gradle Summit. It takes a lot of ideas pioneered by Wuff / Buildship and adds a lot more testing and modularity.
Here’s an example RCP build:
And the project itself:
Version is currently 3.0.0-SNAPSHOT. Seeking feedback before finalizing 3.0.0 final.
Sounds interesting (not at least because Wuff seams to be dead?). Then, on the other side, when yesterday I got 12 mails via Github Wuff all with the same content on Goomph, I thought this must be spam. Also, because the plugin says it’s already at version 3.0.
In my opinion - or: my interests - not supporting Eclipse RCP based targets is the weakest and sadest story of Buildship - because it uses itself Eclipse mechanisms for it’s own build. Ok, I understand, we guys with Eclipse based apps are just a small minority in the Gradle commune.
Then, on the other side, when yesterday I got 12 mails via Github Wuff
Oof, sorry about that. I replied only to questions where there had been no solution, and where Goomph had one ready. Didn’t think about the watchers.
Also, because the plugin says it’s already at version 3.0.
Huh. Where do you see that? It’s at 3.0.0-SNAPSHOT, so I can quickly respond to feedback that requires breaking changes. Probably gonna release 3.0.0 on monday after some early adopters have confirmed that it works for them.