Developing IDE Based on GSF for NetBeans#1 - Minimal Support

There has been GSF (Generic Scripting Framework) which is Tor's working derived and abstracted from Java supporting code, and, the base of Ruby/JavaScript support for NetBeans.

So, how to develop an IDE based on GSF for NetBeans? I'd like to share some experiences in this series of articles, a series of outline description, without too much code and details, for detailed information, please go into the source code on hg.netbeans.org

I. Minimal Support - Highlighting

To implement a minimal support of your editor, you need to implement/extend following classes/interface:

1. public class ScalaLanguage implements GsfLanguage
2. public class ScalaMimeResolver extends MIMEResolver
3. public enum ScalaTokenId implements TokenId
4. public class ScalaLexer implements Lexer<ScalaTokenId>

Where ScalaLexer is the token scanner of your language.

Then, register your language in layer.xml:

<filesystem>
    <folder name="Editors">
        <folder name="text">
            <folder name="x-scala">
                <attr name="SystemFileSystem.localizingBundle" stringvalue="org.netbeans.modules.scala.editing.Bundle"/>

                <file name="language.instance">
                    <attr name="instanceCreate" methodvalue="org.netbeans.modules.scala.editing.lexer.ScalaTokenId.language"/>
                    <attr name="instanceOf" stringvalue="org.netbeans.api.lexer.Language"/>
                </file>
                
                <folder name="FontsColors">
                    <folder name="NetBeans">
                        <folder name="Defaults">
                            <file name="coloring.xml" url="fontsColors.xml">
                                <attr name="SystemFileSystem.localizingBundle" stringvalue="org.netbeans.modules.scala.editing.Bundle"/>
                            </file>
                        </folder>
                    </folder>
                </folder>
                
                <folder name="CodeTemplates">
                    <folder name="Defaults">
                        <file name="codetemplates.xml" url="codetemplates.xml">
                            <attr name="SystemFileSystem.localizingBundle" stringvalue="org.netbeans.modules.scala.editing.Bundle"/>
                        </file>
                    </folder>
                </folder>

                <folder name="Keybindings">
                    <folder name="NetBeans">
                        <folder name="Defaults">
                            <file name="org-netbeans-modules-scala-editing-keybindings.xml" url="DefaultKeyBindings.xml"/>
                        </folder>
                    </folder>
                </folder>
            </folder>
        </folder>
    </folder>
      
    <folder name="GsfPlugins">
        <folder name="text">
            <folder name="x-scala">
                <file name="language.instance">
                    <attr name="instanceOf" stringvalue="org.netbeans.modules.gsf.api.GsfLanguage"/>
                    <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="org.netbeans.modules.scala.editing.ScalaLanguage"/>
                </file>
            </folder>
        </folder>
    </folder>
    
    <folder name="Loaders">
        <folder name="text">
            <folder name="x-scala">
                <attr name="SystemFileSystem.icon" urlvalue="nbresloc:/org/netbeans/modules/scala/editing/resources/scala16x16.png"/>
                <attr name="iconBase" stringvalue="org/netbeans/modules/scala/editing/resources/scala16x16.png"/>
                <folder name="Actions">
                    <file name="OpenAction.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="org.openide.actions.OpenAction"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="100"/>
                    </file>
                    <file name="Separator1.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="javax.swing.JSeparator"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="200"/>
                    </file>
                    <file name="CutAction.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="org.openide.actions.CutAction"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="300"/>
                    </file>     
                    <file name="CopyAction.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="org.openide.actions.CopyAction"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="400"/>
                    </file>
                    <file name="PasteAction.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="org.openide.actions.PasteAction"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="500"/>
                    </file>
                    <file name="Separator2.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="javax.swing.JSeparator"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="600"/>
                    </file>
                    <file name="NewAction.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="org.openide.actions.NewAction"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="700"/>
                    </file>
                    <file name="DeleteAction.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="org.openide.actions.DeleteAction"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="800"/>
                    </file>
                    <file name="RenameAction.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="org.openide.actions.RenameAction"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="900"/>
                    </file>
                    <file name="Separator3.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="javax.swing.JSeparator"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="1000"/>
                    </file>
                    <file name="SaveAsTemplateAction.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="org.openide.actions.SaveAsTemplateAction"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="1100"/>
                    </file>
                    <file name="Separator4.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="javax.swing.JSeparator"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="1200"/>
                    </file>
                    <file name="FileSystemAction.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="org.openide.actions.FileSystemAction"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="1300"/>
                    </file>
                    <file name="Separator5.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="javax.swing.JSeparator"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="1400"/>
                    </file> 
                    <file name="ToolsAction.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="org.openide.actions.ToolsAction"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="1500"/>
                    </file> 
                    <file name="PropertiesAction.instance">
                        <attr name="instanceClass" stringvalue="org.openide.actions.PropertiesAction"/>
                        <attr name="position" intvalue="1600"/>
                    </file> 
                </folder>            
            </folder>
        </folder>
    </folder>
</filesystem>

Don't forget to prepare all these resource files that registered in above layer.xml, such as scala16x16.png etc

After that, write an one-line service descriptor org.openide.filesystems.MIMEResolver under META-INF/services, which looks like

org.netbeans.modules.scala.editing.ScalaMimeResolver

That's it.