PolarSys Improvements/Application Packaging

The general theme for these improvements is to simplify the creation and deployment of Eclipse-based applications.

Eclipse as Ubuntu packages

Ericsson has needs to deploy Eclipse-based applications through debian pacakges. The goals are to facilitate the creation of those packages and also ensure that p2 and debian collaborate.

Create debian packages for Eclipse based application

The goal of this work is to simplify the creation of debian packages (aka .deb file). The requirements are:

• The .deb file should capture its dependencies on other debian packages (e.g. dependency on GCC)
• An Eclipse application developer should be able to create a .deb file for an application from a Maven / tycho build
• The dependencies on debian packages should not be manually authored by the Eclipse application developer. Instead they should be gathered from information specified elsewhere.
• An Eclipse based application will only be made of one debian file.

Install debian package when installing plugins

The goal of this work is to allow users that are installing p2 plug-ins to also get the required native pieces (e.g. GCC). The requirements are:

• An end-user installing plug-ins into Eclipse should get prompted to install native packages when those are necessary to make the plug-ins work.
• Failing to install the native packages should not cause the installation of the Eclipse plug-in to fail.

Work with Ubuntu community to have C/C++ debian package in their repo

Requirements:

• Work with C/C++ EPP package maintainers to make the package available as a debian package on the Eclipse Foundation site.
• Work with the Ubuntu community in order to have the Eclipse C/C++ EPP package be published in one of the repo.

Note that given that this item depends on the Ubuntu community for completion.

Make Installable Units first class citizen

p2 IUs are the underpinning of the deployment of Eclipse-based applications. Up-to-this point they have always been hidden behind cryptic syntax imposing a long trial / error iteration when something custom needed to be performed.

Support the authoring of IU as a standalone entity

This first requirement represents the most minimalistic way of authoring an IU since there no specific editor and IUs are just authored by an XML file. Requirements:

• Provide a tycho packaging type to allow to build the artifact
• Provide a way for the IU to carry its own artifact

The work is tracked in bug [1]

Ease the creation of Eclipse based products

As Ericsson is aiming to create more task-focused tools on the Eclipse platform, it needs to be made easier to create an Eclipse based product. The work captured in this section consists in filling all the gaps identified through various experiments. It is split in large number of small tasks to ease the delivery.

Add missing concepts to the product editor

Description: The product editor provided by PDE has a number of limitation making it difficult to build products. Requirements:

• Specify the p2 repo that will contain the product updates - [2]
• Allow for system properties to be specified for an OS / Arch combination - [3]
• Allow for VM arguments to be specified for an OS / Arch combination - [4]
• Specify the name and location of the CSS file to use - [5]
• Allow for default start level to easily be loaded - [6]
• Allow to populate default preferences from an existing EPF file - [7]

Note that work to support these features through PDE build is out-of-scope

Update site editor to support new concepts

Description: The category.xml editor needs to be improved to support the following things. Requirements:

• Specify repository references in category.xml - [8]
• Specify download stats URL and type of artifacts to monitor in category.xml - [9]

Note that work to support these features through PDE build is out-of-scope

Product validation to report same errors than Tycho

Description: In order to help the author of a product, the product editor performs the validation of paths. These validations are assuming the build is performed with PDE Build and not with Tycho