If you’ve downloaded the localized edition of the IDE and you create and run a new Platform Application choosing the IDE as the base platform (=the default way) it will be localized as well, but if you create a zip distribution of that same application and run it, localization is gone. I’m not sure, but I think it used to work differently in older versions of NB (but I’m not sure). Anyway, here’s a quick fix:
In NetBeans RCP apps you can have localized resources either inside your modules jar or as a separate jar that sits in a locale directory next to your module. The latter is the way NetBeans itself is localized, so all you need to do is grab those files and put them in your distribution. To do so unzip your zip distribution, go to the relevant cluster directory ( e.g. platform9 ), create a dir named “locale” and copy the localization jars from the matching directory of your IDE installation there.
In case you only want a certain localization, copy the files ending with the respective country code ( “de” for german, so it’s “_de.jar” ).
There is some more detailed information about how to proceed from here in these blogs:
Aljoscha Rittner about how to create an installable language pack (in german)
Which is based on Tonny Kohar’s tips about creating a localization plugin
Disclaimer: This is a quick tip, to keep it short I don’t explain all steps in the same detail as I would in a tutorial. If you need more information to get it running, you’re welcome to write a comment and ask for more details…
Whenever you create your own “NetBeans Platform Application” it will display the build number in the Frame Header. At some point during your development you’ll want to get rid of this, the leatest when you’re shipping it. Removing it is easy: Switch to the files tab and in your suite open the file “branding->modules->org-netbeans-core-windows.jar->org->netbeans->core->windows->view->ui->bundle.properies”. Locate the “CTL_MainWindow_Title_No_Project=<your app name> {0}” and remove the “{0}”. That’s it, now your application doesn’t show the build number anymore.
Yesterday I met Emil Ong from Caucho at the DevoXX dinner. He is here to promote Quercus, which is Caucho’s 100% pure Java implementation of PHP. Basically it lets you run PHP applications on Resin taking advantage of Javas speed and reliability. When I mentioned that NetBeans has PHP support in 6.5 we were wondering if it would be possible to use NetBeans to develop and deploy PHP applications for their platform. So today I went to their booth, simply tried it out and here’s the result:
It’s as simple as installing Resin and pointing the “Copy to” dir in the projects properties to the webapps ROOT folder and configure the Project URL to point to port 8080 and it will work. As my example project I used wordpress with a template I created in NetBeans. Try it out! (By the way, their “PHP in Java” approach also works on other application servers where it’s running in interpreted mode).
When you’re starting a “New Platform Appication” the IDE you’re working with will be used as the default platform. But other team members might have a different version of NetBeans running, so they are also developing against a different platform. This can lead to strange problems.
To fix this you can build your own version of the platform. The download page of NetBeans IDE also has a link to the zip distributions. Go there and download the netbeans-xxxx-platform-src.zip of the version you would like to use. Unzip it and open the nbbuild project inside NetBeans.
The platform will only build with JDK 1.5 and the build will use the JDK platform from your running NetBeans by default. If this is 1.6 in your case, then switch to the files tab, select “NetBeans Build System” and then “New->other->properties file”, name it “user.build” and add “nbjdk.home=<JDK 5 home>” (replacing <JDK 5 home> with the actual location on disk).
The project contains a build.xml. You can expand this in the project view. Find the “build-platform” target and run it. Now the platform should be built. If you like you can also add some debugging to the sources. Now go to “Tools->NetBeans Platform” and click “Add Platform”. In your nbbuild dir select the “netbeans” folder. That’s it, now you need to find a way to share this platform with your team members. The easiest way is to check it into your source repository, but it’s up to you. Having your own platform will make life much easier and it also allows you to work together with team members who use no or other IDEs to develop NB modules .
When you create a new NetBeans Platform Application and use the default platform, there’s a little bug you should be aware of. When you create a new Window Component the Wizard will let you choose from the set of available Positions ( =Modes ) in your Platform. That’s nice, but sometimes it doesn’t work. Tanja Drüke has referred to this problem during her talk at the NetBeans Demo Camp in Munich. She had added some Window Components to the “Navigator” mode in her application, but it simply wouldn’t show up there. Instead the Windows would always go to “Explorer” Mode instead.
She finally fixed that by creating her own mode simply copying the mode definition from Navigator, which is a clever & pragmatic way - but what’s the reason for this bug? Actually the wizard shows all modes in the platform you’re using (the IDE in that case) and doesn’t care if the Modules defining the mode is also part of your application. The Navigator Mode isn’t part of the platform (although it probably should be), and by default doesn’t get added to a new Platform Application. When the application is running, the Window System won’t find the mode and add it to the “default” mode instead, which is “Explorer”. We sorted this out during our discussions at the NetBeans Demo Camp in Munich two weeks ago. Should you happen to be in the Munich area join us for the next event for more neat tricks on NetBeans platform development.
Here’s a quick tip from our XING group. If you want to have a protable version of NetBeans to run it from a USB stick, download the “OS-independent.zip” distribution. Unpack it on your usb stick and open /etc/netbeans.conf in a text editor.
Change this:
# ${HOME} will be replaced by JVM user.home system property
netbeans_default_userdir=”${HOME}/.netbeans/6.5rc2″
To something like:
netbeans_default_userdir=”X:/.netbeans/6.5rc2″
assuming X is your USB sticks drive name. You’ll also need to set the path to the JDK here:
# Default location of JDK, can be overridden by using –jdkhome <dir>:
#netbeans_jdkhome=”/path/to/jdk”
e.g.
netbeans_jdkhome=”X:/jdk”
Thanks to Jens Brunken for this tip.
