MyEclipse 6.5 New and Noteworthy Features

All previous New & Noteworthy  |  6.0.1 GA New and Noteworthy  |  MyEclipse 6.5 Blue Edition


6.5 Feature Highlights

The MyEclipse 6.5 release includes feature enhancements and usability additions for the MyEclipse Enterprise Workbench,
including Maven 2 support, Portlet support, upgraded JSF/Facelets visual designers, Spring tools (including Spring 2.5 libraries) and JAX-WS 2.1 Web services.





Maven Project Option:

MyEclipse now allows you to create Web, WebService, and EJB projects with Maven cabilities, in addition to all the normal tooling you expect from these MyEclipse projects


Execute Maven Goals From Within MyEclipse
Run default goals from the "Run As" menu

You may also add any custom goal, including even your own Maven plugins, from within MyEclipse


"Add Dependency"
JARs can be pulled in from central public repository or private repositories by selecting the index from inside Maven4MyEclipse


"Import Legacy Jars Into Maven Repositories Easily"
Only in Maven4MyEclipse can you easily import local JARs directly into your Maven Repository using an easy wizard



JSF Designer: Enhanced Preview MyEclipse Page Designer preview shows Facelet pages as they will be shown to users, including localization and composition.


 


  Preview now renders extended set of JSF tags, including MyFaces Tomahawk library.


 



Custom Facelet Libraries The page editor now uses TLDs for custom Facelet libraries content assist and validation.





Enhanced JSF Config Editor Updated JSF config file editor provides new editing and navigation capabilities.





web.xml Editor The new web.xml editor makes editing and navigating web.xml files easy. Web application configuration may be viewed and edited using form-based editor and accompanying wizards.





Portlet Support:

In MyEclipse 6.5 you can add Portlet support to any MyEclipse Web project.


Select your Portal Engine.


JSR-168 libraries and a new portlet.xml file will be added to your Web project. web.xml will also be suitably modified.

New Portlet Wizard:

Use the new Portlet wizard (File > New > Other... > MyEclipse > Web > Portlet) wizard to create a JSR-168 compliant Portlet.



This two page wizard will create the Portlet class, required resources and register your new portlet in the portlet descriptor (portlet.xml). Two predefined templates ease the portlet creation process.


Portlet Deployment:

To deploy your portal application to a JSR 168-compatible portal server, the project should be exported as deployable WAR file.




NOTE: Each portal server has it's own proprietary deployment requirements, MyEclipse does not support these at this time but they will be improved in a future release.


JAX-WS 2.0 Framework Support:

MyEclipse 6.5 introduces support for the JAX-WS framework based on version 1.1 of the Metro stack. Metro is the JAX-WS reference implementation for Java EE 5.
Support includes the ability to generate contract first (top down) or code first (bottom up) web services as well as web service clients.

New Web Service Project Wizard:

You can create a new Web Services project or generate web services into an existing MyEclipse Web project.

Top Down & Bottom Up Service Generation:

Web services can be generated from WSDL files or from existing Java beans.

Top Down Generation:

Specify a WSDL file to have a web service generated from it.

The web service generation process will update web.xml and sun-jaxws.xml according to the service generated.

Note: If you are deploying your service to a server which does not include the JAX-WS stack, you must add the JAX-WS API and Runtime libraries to your project; your web service will not work otherwise.

Bottom Up Generation:

Generate a web service from a Java bean.

Client Generation:

Web service clients can be generated directly from WSDL files.



JAX-WS 2.1 API and Runtime containers are added to client projects to fulfill runtime library requirements.


Spring:

MyEclipse 6.5 Spring Tools are based on Spring IDE 2.0.4 and include enhancements and optimizations specifically tailored for seamless operation with the MyEclipse application development technology stack.

Spring 2.5:

MyEclipse 6.5 adds support for Spring 2.5. MyEclipse 6.5 bundles Spring 2.5.4.

Spring 2 libraries have also been upgraded to version 2.0.8.

Spring Explorer: The Spring Beans view has been superseded by the Spring Explorer view. The Spring Explorer is a filtered tree view which displays all Spring projects in your workspace along with any beans, config sets and Spring Web Flow elements it may contain. This view is namespace aware and can be highly filtered and customized.



The Spring Explorer view will also specially annotate any beans defined via Spring Java Configuration.

Project Explorer:

All Spring projects will contain a "Spring Elements" child when seen in the Project Explorer view. This item can be expanded to show beans, config sets and web flow definitions just like the Spring Explorer view described above. The ability to see list of all beans which reference a particular Java class is a key feature.

LIke the Spring Explorer, the Spring elements shown in this view can be filtered and customized. You can also use a special Spring working set to cut down the clutter in the Project Explorer.

AOP Support:

The Beans Cross References view will show you all beans being advised as well as those which advise other beans.

The Spring Configuration editor as well as the Java editor will display special markers for methods and classes affected by your project's AOP configuration.


The Spring AOP Event Trace view will give you an idea of what is going on under the covers as Spring IDE's internal AOP model is being built.

AOP support requires the AOP Reference Model Builder which can be enabled / disabled at both the project and global level. If you do not use AOP in your projects, you can turn it off globally.

Pointcut Matches:

In addition to the Bean search, you can now search for Pointcut Matches in your workspace from the Search menu.

Namespace Support:

The new Spring Bean Definition wizard allows you to easily create configuration files with required namespaces.

The Spring Configuration editor is also namespace aware and will provide intelligent content assist and validation for defined elements.

Autocompletion in the popular 'p' namespace:

Refactoring:

Renaming a Java class will now automatically make changes in bean definitions referencing that class. Java classes may also be renamed directly from the bean configuration file.

Bean Ids may also be renamed.

Renaming a bean property will make changes in corresponding Java class.

Validation Control:

Validation settings can be controlled at a project (Project Properties > MyEclipse > Spring) or a global level (Window > Preferences > MyEclipse > Spring).

Mylyn Integration:

If you have Mylyn integrated, the Spring Explorer, Beans Cross References and Project Explorer view will allow you to filter the displayed content based on "level of interest". This includes bean definitions and referenced Java classes.

Content assist proposals will also be sorted based on their "level of interest".

Spring Web Flow:

MyEclipse 6.5 also adds Spring Web Flow support. 6.5 includes Spring Web Flow 1.0.5 libraries.


Web Flow Editor:

Use the graphical editor to easily create states, actions and transitions.



Web flow definition files may also be edited in the XML editor with web flow specific content assist support.

Validation for web flow definition files is customizable.


Hibernate 3.2 & Hibernate Annotations Support:

MyEclipse 6.5 includes Hibernate 3.2 and Hibernate Annotations support.



The reverse engineering wizard can generate annotated POJOs instead of simple POJOs and mapping files (hbm.xml).


Annotation support is also available for Spring - Hibernate projects.


HQL and Criteria editors continue to work when Hibernate annotations are used, even in Spring - Hibernate projects.

New Hibernate Mapping Editor:

With the new Design page and accompanying wizards, editing mapping files is a cinch.




Query Improvements:

The HQL and Criteria editors now include a Max Results combo with which you can restrict the number of results returned by a query.

Content assist is provided for HQL queries in @NamedQuery annotations, these queries will also be validated.

Note: The HQL / Criteria editor for the project must be opened at least once per session for the above features to activate. This process will be improved in future releases.

While editing a NamedQuery annotation, you can invoke quick fix (usually Ctrl + 1) inside the query attribute to get a Copy to HQL Editor action.

Selecting this action will open the HQL editor, initialized with the query string. You can test and edit your query in the HQL editor, when done, closing the editor will allow you to copy the modified query back into the query attribute in the Java editor.

Similarly, when typing out a Criteria in the Java editor,  selecting it and invoking quick fix will show you a Copy to Criteria Edior action.

Selecting this action will open the Criteria editor, initialized with the selected text. You can test and edit the criteria in the Criteria editor, when done, closing the editor will allow you replace the originally selected text with the modified criteria query.


MyEclipse 6.5 New & Noteworthy

MyEclipse Innovations

The innovation and application of Eclipse technology is Genuitec's sole business. With well over 10 million downloads, MyEclipse Enterprise Workbench has grown to be the most popular and successful Eclipse-based JEE IDE. Our history of blending the best of open source with commercial-grade developed tools has created a long chain of Eclipse technology innovation that includes: