LiClipse

[Wanderer]

I just updated PyDev and I got this message that they are looking for funding for a new flavor of Eclipse called LiClipse. The description of what LiClipse will be is kind of sketchy. No offense intended, but why? There is already a bunch of downloads at Eclipse and there is also Easy Eclipse. The only reason for a redesign of Eclipse, I would want would be change it from being Java based. Oracle is losing money and I wonder what their next business model will be for Java. Anyway, does anyone know what this LiClipse is all about?

Thanks

 

[Steven D'Aprano]

I just updated PyDev and I got this message that they are looking for
funding for a new flavor of Eclipse called LiClipse. The description of
what LiClipse will be is kind of sketchy. No offense intended, but why?
There is already a bunch of downloads at Eclipse and there is also Easy
Eclipse. The only reason for a redesign of Eclipse, I would want would
be change it from being Java based. Oracle is losing money and I wonder
what their next business model will be for Java. Anyway, does anyone
know what this LiClipse is all about?

No idea. Who did you get the message from? Perhaps you should ask them.
Or ask on an Eclipse forum. Or try googling for "Liclipse", which brings
me to this:

http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/pydev-and-liclipse-for-a-fast-sexy-and-
dark-eclipse

 

[Verde Denim]

I just updated PyDev and I got this message that they are looking for funding for a new flavor of Eclipse called LiClipse. The description of what LiClipse will be is kind of sketchy. No offense intended, but why? There is already a bunch of downloads at Eclipse and there is also Easy Eclipse. The only reason for a redesign of Eclipse, I would want would be change it from being Java based. Oracle is losing money and I wonder what their next business model will be for Java. Anyway, does anyone know what this LiClipse is all about?

Thanks

Check this -
http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/pydev-and-liclipse-for-a-fast-sexy-and-dark-eclipse
described as a toolchain with plugins and a sleek UI for Eclipse; sounds
like a fork...

--
Regards

Jack
Boston Tea Party, Coercive Acts, Powder Alarm, Revolution
Lessons (mistakes) not learned are bound to be repeated.

 

[rusi]

Hello there,

As I've proposed it, let me try to explain it a bit better (if you have
doubts, I should probably rephrase the proposal).

There are 2 main targets there: keeping PyDev properly supported (which
hopefully doesn't need more explanation) and creating LiClipse.

The idea for LiClipse is definitely not making a fork, but having an easier
way to add a basic editor inside Eclipse (while developing PyDev, I do get
many requests for adding support for editors related to Python, such as
Django templates, Mako, Restructured text, Cython, etc), so, this will
provide me with a basis to do that (and with the basis in place, the idea
is having the possibility of creating an editor without knowledge of
Eclipse and in a very fast way -- current technologies for that such as
DLTK or XText aim much higher and are not trivial. I really want to have a
way to have a basic editor inside Eclipse just specifying the language very
'loosely' -- say, something that'd take you 15-30 minutes and almost no
special knowledge of Eclipse internals -- and which would need more
knowledge of Eclipse internals only for more advanced stuff).

As for the dark theme, it's something that annoys me a lot (so, I was
hoping it was also something interesting for other people -- right now,
it's not possible to have a professional dark theme in Eclipse, there are
many loose ends -- so, for those that would like to work with a dark theme
-- as myself -- it may be very annoying -- although yes, it may not be
applicable if you're happy with the current non-dark UI).

As for distributions, yes, I plan to do an Eclipse distribution with
LiClipse / PyDev bundled -- Easy Eclipse is definitely not a solution as it
is NOT supported (it has an ancient version of PyDev which only serves to
confuse users and Eclipse.org does not have a Python version with PyDev).
I'd hardly call that a fork thought (and it should be possible to install
it as a separate plugin anyways, so, you can use the Eclipse you got from
anywhere and just use the update site to get those plugins).

Cheers,

Fabio

I am interested in the new eclipse plugin capabilities.
Where does liclipse stand with respect to this?
ie Eclipse-4 claims to have made plugin development (for new custom
languages) easier.
What is the relation of liclipse to eclipse 3<->4 plugin architecture?

 

[Fabio Zadrozny]

I am interested in the new eclipse plugin capabilities.
Where does liclipse stand with respect to this?

The idea is providing a way to add a language just by saying things like
keywords, elements (such as function or class -- if your language has
that), indenting words and it'll provide you an editor that has all the
common functions you'd expect, such as syntax highlighting, outline,
indenting, template completion, etc. So, in LiClipse, you shouldn't need to
create a plugin at this level, just one configuration file (which you
should be able to fill in 15-30 minutes).

After that, if you want more things (such as code analysis or a semantic
aware code completion), then you'd have to go the route of actually
creating an Eclipse plugin.

ie Eclipse-4 claims to have made plugin development (for new custom
languages) easier.
What is the relation of liclipse to eclipse 3<->4 plugin architecture?

Well, it may have become a bit easier (with dltk and xtext), but it's still
far from trivial (you still have to know at least java, how plugins work,
eclipse internals, creating a grammar, etc.).

The editors structure for LiClipse should work in both Eclipse 3 or 4,
although the theming enhancements will require Eclipse 4 (as it'll need
some features only available there).

Cheers,

Fabio

 

[Wanderer]

I am interested in the new eclipse plugin capabilities.

Where does liclipse stand with respect to this?



The idea is providing a way to add a language just by saying things like keywords, elements (such as function or class -- if your language has that), indenting words and it'll provide you an editor that has all the common functions you'd expect, such as syntax highlighting, outline, indenting, template completion, etc. So, in LiClipse, you shouldn't need to create a plugin at this level, just one configuration file (which you should be able to fill in 15-30 minutes).




After that, if you want more things (such as code analysis or a semantic aware code completion), then you'd have to go the route of actually creating an Eclipse plugin.
 


ie Eclipse-4 claims to have made plugin development (for new custom

languages) easier.

What is the relation of liclipse to eclipse 3<->4 plugin architecture?



Well, it may have become a bit easier (with dltk and xtext), but it's still far from trivial (you still have to know at least java, how plugins work, eclipse internals, creating a grammar, etc.).




The editors structure for LiClipse should work in both Eclipse 3 or 4, although the theming enhancements will require Eclipse 4 (as it'll need some features only available there).




Cheers,


Fabio

Thanks for the response. Now I understand better what you're trying to do. Eclipse can be something of a pain to get basic support to use new languages. I never was able to get it to work with Vpascal. I would also like the bundle, since I can't get the version in the lab to work like the version onmy desk. I've never been one for dark themes. My pet peeve is the battle over negative numbers between PyDev and pep8.py. PyDev put the space in and pep8.py gives me a warning.

Anyway, PyDev deserves my support and thank you for all your hard work.

 

[Wanderer]

I am interested in the new eclipse plugin capabilities.

Where does liclipse stand with respect to this?



The idea is providing a way to add a language just by saying things like keywords, elements (such as function or class -- if your language has that), indenting words and it'll provide you an editor that has all the common functions you'd expect, such as syntax highlighting, outline, indenting, template completion, etc. So, in LiClipse, you shouldn't need to create a plugin at this level, just one configuration file (which you should be able to fill in 15-30 minutes).




After that, if you want more things (such as code analysis or a semantic aware code completion), then you'd have to go the route of actually creating an Eclipse plugin.
 


ie Eclipse-4 claims to have made plugin development (for new custom

languages) easier.

What is the relation of liclipse to eclipse 3<->4 plugin architecture?



Well, it may have become a bit easier (with dltk and xtext), but it's still far from trivial (you still have to know at least java, how plugins work, eclipse internals, creating a grammar, etc.).




The editors structure for LiClipse should work in both Eclipse 3 or 4, although the theming enhancements will require Eclipse 4 (as it'll need some features only available there).




Cheers,


Fabio

Thanks for the response. Now I understand better what you're trying to do. Eclipse can be something of a pain to get basic support to use new languages. I never was able to get it to work with Vpascal. I would also like the bundle, since I can't get the version in the lab to work like the version onmy desk. I've never been one for dark themes. My pet peeve is the battle over negative numbers between PyDev and pep8.py. PyDev put the space in and pep8.py gives me a warning.

Anyway, PyDev deserves my support and thank you for all your hard work.

 

[Fabio Zadrozny]

keywords, elements (such as function or class -- if your language has
that), indenting words and it'll provide you an editor that has all the
common functions you'd expect, such as syntax highlighting, outline,
indenting, template completion, etc. So, in LiClipse, you shouldn't need to
create a plugin at this level, just one configuration file (which you
should be able to fill in 15-30 minutes).
aware code completion), then you'd have to go the route of actually
creating an Eclipse plugin.
still far from trivial (you still have to know at least java, how plugins
work, eclipse internals, creating a grammar, etc.).
although the theming enhancements will require Eclipse 4 (as it'll need
some features only available there).

Thanks for the response. Now I understand better what you're trying to do.
Eclipse can be something of a pain to get basic support to use new
languages. I never was able to get it to work with Vpascal. I would also
like the bundle, since I can't get the version in the lab to work like the
version on my desk. I've never been one for dark themes. My pet peeve is
the battle over negative numbers between PyDev and pep8.py. PyDev put the
space in and pep8.py gives me a warning.

I remember report like that, unfortunately, in the last months working at
Appcelerator, it was very difficult to actually work on PyDev (as it wasn't
a priority for them), but if the funding succeeds, I hope to fix those
annoyances (formatting should definitely respect pep8).

 

[rusi]

Well, it may have become a bit easier (with dltk and xtext), but it's still
far from trivial (you still have to know at least java, how plugins work,
eclipse internals, creating a grammar, etc.).

I still have one (quite general) question:
When eclipse 'does' pydev, is it mostly in java or in python?

Using python's native parser etc makes the analysis more reliable at
the cost of more fragile, non-portable(?) etc plumbing between java
and python.

Whereas rewriting python's parsing etc in java, makes the basic
architecture easier but will always keep you behind target when say
python changes/adds to its syntax/feature set etc.

Which do you choose? And are the new facilities in Juno easier for
cross-language feature-sets?

 

[Fabio Zadrozny]

I still have one (quite general) question:
When eclipse 'does' pydev, is it mostly in java or in python?

Using python's native parser etc makes the analysis more reliable at
the cost of more fragile, non-portable(?) etc plumbing between java
and python.

Whereas rewriting python's parsing etc in java, makes the basic
architecture easier but will always keep you behind target when say
python changes/adds to its syntax/feature set etc.

Parsing in PyDev is done at java (so, yes, I have to update it when Python
itself goes forward).

Still, note that even if I was in Python and could use the Python parser, I
don't think that using the internal Python parser would be a good choice
(because it ends up being too fragile for me -- i.e.: if the IDE is done
using Python 2.x it wouldn't be able to analyze a Python 3 codebase --
unless it spawned scripts based on the configured Python you're developing
against, but things as a proper code analysis would prove very difficult to
do that way).

Also, the feature set from the PyDev grammar is different from the Python
grammar:

For example:
- it has to be fault tolerant (because you'll still want to see the outline
and get code completion even if you don't have the complete file correct)
- it may need to store more information in case a pretty-printing is needed
later on (so, the Python grammar can get something as "a = (1)" and remove
the parenthesis as they don't make part of the AST, as that's the same as
"a = 1" but in case you were pretty-printing the AST you may not want to
throw that away).

Which do you choose? And are the new facilities in Juno easier for
cross-language feature-sets?

As for easier cross-language feature sets, not sure what exactly are you
referring to... (but I don't think Eclipse 4 itself changed much from the
existing status quo... it's may difference in the programming model is on
the dependency injection, so some APIs are cleaner now -- besides the UI
changes).

Cheers,

Fabio