Release 4.1.1 ; New MyEclipse Desktop actions, Web 2.0 Browser, Hibernate Forward Engineering Wizard, Hibernate Reverse Engineering Customization
   
  MyEclipse 4.1.1 New and Noteworthy (Most recent GA Release); MyEclipse 5.0M1 New and Noteworthy (Most recent Development Release)

Feature Highlights

The 5.0M2 release includes major enhancements and bug fixes for the MyEclipse environment, including:  

  • Full compatibility with Eclipse 3.2 and Callisto projects

  • Matisse4MyEclipse integration into MyEclipse (now with full support for Linux)
  • Web Services support, including:
    • Project and project creation wizard
    • Customizable library containers
    • New Web Services Wizard
    • Deploy web-service web-app
    • Services.xml file editor
    • Java editor with JSR-181 annotation support and code-assist
    • WSDL editor
    • Web Services Explorer
    • Java hot-swap debug support & MyEclipse hot-sync web resource support for web services application
    • Quick-start documentation and example projects - will demo how to hook into MyEclipse database, hibernate and Spring features for RAD experience
  • New Server View
  • Cross-platform Visual HTML Editor (Windows & Linux supported)
  • Expanded database support for MS SQL Server and Sybase
  • Enhanced Hibernate 3.1.X and Spring 2.X support (planned M3/GA release)
  • JSF EL Code Assist
  • AJAX/Web 2.0 tool extensions (now available on Linux and Mac)
  • Full I18N support for internationalization and localized support (target languages after the 5.0 GA release will include Japanese, German, French and Spanish)
  • And more!

MyEclipse 5.0 M2 is the first IDE compatible with Eclipse 3.2 and accompanying Callisto project offerings. Be sure to install the Eclipse 3.2 SDK prior to installation of MyEclipse 5.0M2. Please note that all additional Callisto-compatible projects that are required by MyEclipse are part of our distribution. As a result, the recommended installation order is Eclipse 3.2 SDK, MyEclipse 5.0M2, and then any additional Callisto-compatible projects / products.

MyEclipse-Callisto Integration
MyEclipse 5.0 is built on top of the Eclipse 3.2 SDK and the Callisto platform projects. Callisto is a coordinated release of 10 Eclipse projects. By building upon Callisto, MyEclipse 5.0 now provides convenient update access to new tools and frameworks such as: C++ tools, the BIRT reporting framework and the Visual Editor framework.

One of the key benefits of adopting MyEclipse is that it was the first product to integrate the Web Tool Platform (WTP) almost 2 years ago. Since then MyEclipse has introduced hundreds of bug fixes and enhancements to the initial WTP platform. Over time WTP has undergone a major rearchitecture and revision that is not backward compatible with the version MyEclipse adopted. 

Many of the MyEclipse WTP revisions and enhancements are now becoming available in the WTP 1.5. release. Therefore MyEclipse 5.0 has merged back onto the WTP 1.5+ branch and will maintain compatibility with it in all future releases.



MyEclipse Updates
 The Eclipse Update Facility is preconfigured to recognize MyEclipse updates, Eclipse project updates and Callisto platform plugins.


MyEclipse Web Service Tools MyEclipse 5.0 M2 introduces a wide range of productivity tools and services to assist in the development, deployment, and testing of web services. MyEclipse Web Service Tools use the XFire 1.2 Java SOAP framework. XFire is an open-source, next generation, standards-based framework. It includes:
  • Web Service standards: SOAP, WSDL, WS-I Basic Profile, WS-Addressing, WS-Security, JSR-181 WS annotations
  • Java-XML binding technology: Aegis, JAXB2 & 1, XMLBeans, Castor, and JIBX
  • Multiple transport support: HTTP, JMS, XMPP, in-memory
  • High performance SOAP stack
  • many more...


New Web Service Project Capability MyEclipse web service capabilities enable all MyEclipse web service tools and services to recognize and operate correctly within a project. A project configured with MyEclipse web service capabilities can be identified with the bell overlay icon, and will have the MyEclipse web service nature and a special builder that manages staging of the XFire services.xml deployment descriptor file during application server deployment. See the Web Service Project Wizard for how to create a MyEclipse web services project.

Note: the next release will include the ability to add Web Service Capabilities to existing projects.



MyEclipse XFire Libraries MyEclipse-XFire libraries simplify the build-path management of XFire JARs. The libraries are organized around XFire features. Thus you can pick and choose the XFire features that you wish to support with in your project by adding or removing the feature-specific MyEclipse-XFire libraries.


MyEclipse Web Service Preferences The MyEclipse web service preferences enable you to configure the JAR contents of the MyEclipse-XFire libraries. To access this preference page, from the workbench menubar select Window>Preferences>MyEclipse>Project Capabilities>Web Services.


 
Web Service Project Wizard
The Web Service Project Wizard enables you to quickly create a MyEclipse J2EE web project configured with web service capabilities. MyEclipse web service capabilities enable all MyEclipse web service tools and services to recognize and operate correctly within a project. During the project creation process the web project is configured with the XFire servlet.

Launch the Web Services Project wizard by selecting File>New>Project...>MyEclipse>J2EE Projects>Web Service Project.



Specify web project details.



Specify XFire servlet and services.xml deployment descriptor details.



Select the MyEclipse-XFire libraries that will be added to the new project's build-path.



Upon completion of the wizard a new web project with web services capabilities will be created and configured.


Web Service Wizard - Code-first/bottom-up scenario
 The MyEclipse Web Service Wizard supports the code-first web service development scenario. Code-first concentrates initial development effort towards the creation of application business logic in the form of Java beans (POJOs) prior to defining the web service interfaces (WSDL). The wizard supports creation of web services from existing Java beans or will generate new Java beans if instructed.

Launch the web service wizard from the MyEclipse perspective toolbar.

 

Select the web service capable project in which the new web service will be created and the Bottom-up scenario option.



Enter the new web service name and implementation details. Select Finish to create the web service.



Upon completion the wizard has created the Java interface, IHelloWorldService, the Java class, HelloWorldServiceImpl, and added a <service> entry in the XFire services.xml deployment descriptor.

 
Web Service Wizard - Interface-first/top-down scenario
 The MyEclipse Web Service Wizard supports the code-first web service development scenario. Code-first concentrates initial development effort towards the creation of application business logic in the form of Java beans (POJOs) prior to defining the web service interfaces (WSDL). The wizard supports creation of web services from existing Java beans or will generate new Java beans if instructed.




Specify the WSDL file location, the Java-XML binding to generate, and the Java source folder and package where web service skeleton will be generated. Select Finish to complete the wizard.



Upon completion the wizard has added a <service> entry to the services.xml file and generated the Java-XML binding classes, the HelloWorldServicePortType interface, the HelloWorldServiceImpl class and the HellowWorldServiceClient class. Note that the project's compiler compatibility settings must be set to Java5 or greater as the generated Java code includes Java 5 - JSR-181 annotations.


Services.xml Deployment Descriptor Editor
The XFire framework is configured with by services.xml deployment descriptor file. This file is a Spring beans XML configuration file that utilizes XBean customizations. The MyEclipse XFire Deployment Descriptor Editor extends the MyEclipse XML Editor with grammar-based code-assistance and validation using an implicit special XFire DTD, custom code-assist for XML elements that define Java classes and interfaces.


JAX-WS/JSR-181 Annotation Support
MyEclipse enables the Java Editor to support JSR-181 annotations. Simply add the MyEclipse-XFire Core library to your web service project's build-path and the Java Editor will immediately begin recognizing web service annotations.


Web Service Explorer
The Web Service Explorer enables you to test any web services for which a WSDL document is accessible. The Web Service Explorer reads a WSDL document for the service you wish to interact with and generates a dynamic interface that allows you to send SOAP requests and view corresponding SOAP responses.


Launch the Web Services Explorer from the MyEclipse perspective toolbar.


Select the WSDL mode and enter the path to the WSDL file. In the example below we used the URL http://localhost:8080/HelloWorld/services/HelloWorldService?WSDL. Once the WSDL is retrieved the Web Service Explorer will present a list of end points. Below you can see the 'example' operation is exposed and has 1 input parameter named in0. When the Go button is pressed, a SOAP request is constructed to invoke the 'example' operation and the string 'helloworld' is bound to the in0 parameter in the request. The result of the operation is displayed in the Status pane.


Web Service Deployment and Debugging The MyEclipse J2EE application deployment service recognizes and is able to deploy MyEclipse J2EE web and enterprise projects configured with MyEclipse web services capabilities. The deployment services are able to package and publish the web service project in both exploded archive form for development time debugging and in packaged archive form for production time distribution. The deployment service provides hot-sync update of all modified Java and web resources of a web service project to all of its exploded deployments.



Once deployed, standard MyEclipse web debugging facilities are available to all web services projects. These include hot-swap Java debugging and hot-sync JSP and JavaScript debugging.


Web Service Project Properties
 The MyEclipse web service project properties dialog enables you to define the design-time location of the XFire services.xml deployment descriptor file within the project.


WSDL File Wizard
   The WSDL File Wizard will create a skeleton WSDL file. To launch the wizard, select File>New>Other>MyEclipse>Web Services>WSDL.



Enter the namespace and select 'Create WSDL Skeleton'. Select Finish to complete the wizard and generate the file.



Upon completion the skeleton WSDL file is created and opened in the MyEclipse XML editor for review and revision.


Enhanced MyEclipse AJAX Features

The AJAX tools have some new enhancements that make it easier to work with AJAX web applications.  You can now observe any AJAX requests headers that are made from the Web2.0 browser.  Also, since most AJAX requests will modify the contents of the browser DOM upon completion, you can now see the DOM source of any node in the browser document.

The following new AJAX features are shown below:

  • Enhanced Web2.0 Browser with selection mapping and clear cache actions
  • New AJAX Request Monitor View
  • New DOM Source View

AJAX Request Monitor

When an AJAX request is made from the Web2.0 Browser, open the AJAX Request Monitor view to see a copy of the headers and body of the request.  Below, you can see the URL of the AJAX request including the query parameters and also the return response text.

The AJAX Request Monitor is now part of the Web2.0 Perspective by default.  To see this view either reset your Web2.0 Perspective or use Window > Show View > MyEclipse Enterprise Workbench > AJAX Request Monitor.

DOM Source View

Most AJAX applications will modify the contents of a particular DOM element upon completion of an AJAX request.  You can use the DOM Source view to inspect the runtime source of these DOM nodes.  Simply select the node you are interested in the DOM Inspector and its source will be displayed in the DOM Source view.

The DOM Source view is now part of the Web2.0 Perspective by default.  To see this view either reset your Web2.0 Perspective or use Window > Show View > MyEclipse Enterprise Workbench > DOM Source.
Web2.0 Browser Enhancements

The Web2.0 Browser has a new selection mapping mode that you can toggle on and then get visual highlighted feedback for the available nodes in the browser that can be selected.

Now there is an easy way to clear the browser cache using a new toolbar action.

New Server View

The new Server View provides a centralized display of enabled appservers and active deployments. Starting or configuring a server and managing deployments is fast & easy with the Server View toolbar.

New server connectors have been added for Glassfish and Sun Java System Application Server Edition 9.

The new server centric Deployment Dialog allows you to conveniently manage all projects deployed to a particular server.

Server Launch Configurations

The process of creating a new customized launch configuration is summarized in the following screenshots.

New MyEclipse Visual HTML Designer (Windows and Linux Only)

In MyEclipse 5.0M2, the new MyEclipse Visual HTML Designer has been made the default HTML editor.  This replaces both the older version of the HTML Designer that has been in MyEclipse since 4.0 and the HTML 'Classic' Editor that has been in MyEclispe since 3.8.

Benefits of the new Visual HTML Designer:

  • Speed increase:  The performance of Source/Design synchronization operations have improved dramatically over the previous HTML Designer.
  • Increased Reliability: Editing in both source and design view now is much more reliable and will maintain the integrity of your edit operations.
  • Cross-platform support: The Visual Designer now supports both Windows and Linux.  Mac OS X support is planned for a future release.
Cross-platform technology works on Windows and Linux

New Visual HTML Designer on Windows:

New Visual HTML Designer on Linux.  (Redhat 4 Enterprise is used in image below)


Older HTML Designer and 'Classic' Editor still available

The previous HTML Designer and 'Classic' HTML Editor that were available by default in versions of MyEclipse prior to 5.0 M2 are still available through the capabilities configuration.  (Window > Preferences > General > Capabilities)

Once you have brought up the capabilities preference click 'Advanced' and expand the MyEclipse Standard Tools.  Select the Classic Editors entry to see the 4.x HTML Designer and the 'Classic' HTML and JSP Editors.

Matisse4MyEclipse now includes Linux Support

In M2, Matisse4MyEclipse is now available on all Linux platforms.  Below is a screenshot of it running on Redhat 4 Enterprise.


New Support for Microsoft SQL Server & Sybase Procedures

The Database explorer will now display Procedures which are part of your MS SQL or Sybase schema.

The Table/Object Info view displays a structured view of the selected procedure.

Procedure source can be viewed in the SQL Editor using the Open action.

New Edit Table View

View & Edit data in multiple tables using the new Edit Table view.

Delete All Rows Script

The Delete All Rows script allows you to easily delete all rows in your table.


Extended DAO Generation

New Basic DAOs function independent of either Spring or JNDI
Precise findBy methods make it easy to locate entities

JSF EL Code Assist

Content assist that suggests both beans defined in the JSF configuration file(s) by the user and predefined variables. 

Content assist is also available for property and method names.


JSF EL Validation

JSF EL validation allows early detection of the misspelled bean names and property names:

Spring IDE 1.3 Integration MyEclipse 5.0M2 integrates SpringIDE 1.3, bringing in new features and fixes for our Spring Toolset. The integration allows users to seamlessly use SpringIDE in a MyEclipse environment with MyEclipse projects. Libraries have been upgraded to Spring version 1.2.8.
New Spring Beans Search

Use Search > Spring Beans... to search for Spring beans in your workspace.
Ctrl + Shift + G in the Beans Config Editor immediately searches for references of the bean under the cursor.

New Open Bean Dialog

Use the universal Alt + Shift + B combo or Navigate > Open Spring Bean to bring up the new Open Bean dialog and navigate to the appropriate beans config file.

Improved Property Hyperlink Navigation

Hyperlink navigation for Properties now supports property paths.