Okay, question then: 

Would the data formats that the user may create on their own in the camel config be queriable and have normal text names, like CSV?  If so, wouldn’t it be better just to add those to the existing list of formats (i.e., Java, XSD, CSV, etc.), then use the existing path fields to select the model?  I’m assuming that anytime the data type calls for a model, i.e., Java, CSV, etc., that the browser buttons for the path fields would restrict the available selections to classes on the class path.

BTW, I like the idea of making the source and target fields horizontally next to each other.

On Mar 19, 2015, at 1:49 PM, Keith Babo <kbabo@redhat.com> wrote:

The reason of the extra pages is that we already ask for eight pieces of information from the user on a single page of the wizard and issue 151 would add four more, which is a bit crowded for a single page, IMO.  Of course, this has to be balanced against the annoyance of multi-page wizards in general, but I think it’s a favorable tradeoff.


On Mar 19, 2015, at 1:57 PM, Johnny Verhaeg <verhaeg@icloud.com> wrote:

We’d already agreed to make the paths for both source and target required in the wizard, so I have no problem with removing the “change” ability from the editor.  Not sure if I see the advantage of the extra pages, but maybe Brian’s mockups with shed light on that.

On Mar 19, 2015, at 12:36 PM, Keith Babo <kbabo@redhat.com> wrote:


On Mar 19, 2015, at 1:23 PM, John Verhaeg <verhaeg@icloud.com> wrote:

I'm probably missing something, but if the user doesn't select the path for Java types, what do we show in the editor in the model viewers?

My initial thought was that they could just select it from the mapper, but after i thought about it some more I wrote the last bit of my email about selecting the Java type in the wizard.



Another idea I’ve been playing around with is removing support for changing the source and target types in the editor and instead allowing the user to select the target type in the wizard.  Since changing a source or target type invalidates all mappings anyway, I don’t think this is much of an inconvenience.  It also makes life simpler as we won’t need to change the Camel config from within the mapper editor any longer to update source/target types.  If we went ahead with this plan, then my comments above about skipping the source/target pages in the wizard would no longer apply.  Instead, we would have a page where the user had a type browser where they selected the source and target type on each page.

So if the user changes their mind about source and/or target, they just delete the existing transformation.xml before restarting the wizard?

Sorry, I phrased the last part of my initial email bit poorly and conflated two things.  I will break them up:

1) We should prompt for the model class in the new transformation wizard for Java source/target types.
2) If we do (1), we have an option to remove support for changing the type in the editor.

We should definitely do (1), in my opinion.  (2) is optional - an advantage is that it removes the need to prompt for camel context location when opening a map directly from the project explorer.

regards,
keith