E4/Eclipse Application Model

a.k.a. "the twenty things"

This is a first list of "recommended APIs" - things that we expect most Eclipse plug-ins would make use of (if applicable).

Note that "the Workbench", "PlatformUI" or "Platform" are not on this list. Think of which services you would want to use from within your contributed view or editor.

Kevin McGuire - Some of these support a component model, and some provide an application framework of common elements. It'd be worthwhile to identify this split since the former are essential for a web based Eclipse component model. For example, Selection service is needed so one can write independent views/editors and have them work together. Without it, there's no component interaction. Similarly, IMenuService and commands allow fine grain component interaction, so one plugin can say add a menu to a view it doesn't know about. UI State persistence though can be supported in a number of ways. Help is purely an application framework item.

Kevin McGuire - We should have Commands as a top level item although we have an entire subject page on commands. Plus here need to tie commands in with menu service and handlers (not sure right organization)

Selection

ISelectionService - Listening to the current selection

Adapting objects

IAdapterManager - adapt an object (typically, the current selection) to a type that is relevant to the current plug-in

Scheduling background work

IProgressService - Schedule work in a way that is visible to the user Job, IJobManager - schedule and manage background jobs

Help

IWorkbenchHelpSystem

Undo/Redo

IWorkbenchOperationSupport

Preferences

IPreferencesService - retrieve and modify preferences

Handlers

IHandlerService - register a handler for a global command like Copy/Paste

Bjorn asks: where is the list of the global commands? Do we have a namespace of commands? Can any plug-in contribute to the set of commands? How do we know what the semantics of a given command are?

UI Contributions

IMenuService - programmatic contribution to menus and toolbars

Open web pages

IWorkbenchBrowserSupport

Decorations

IDecoratorManager

Common UI Elements

Wizard framework, Dialogs --- Added - KevinM

Dynamic enablement

IExtensionTracker - ability to react to components coming and going at runtime

UI state persistence

IDialogSettings, IMemento - Persistence of UI state: layouts, dialog sizes, viewer selection and expansion state

Extension registry

IExtensionRegistry - registering and accessing extensions and extension points