[seam-dev] Seam gen redesign

Max and I spent some time thinking about how to improve on the seam- gen maintenance problem (2000 lines of ant is a bit nasty), and also make it easier for JBoss Tools to consume the templates etc. Feature Comparison ------------------- Seam-gen JBoss Tools Notes --------- ------------ ------- Ant controlled (seam-gen/build.xml) --------> Wizard controlled Totally different system, probably not much duplication dev/prod/staging profile -------------------> dev profile only Hard to do profiles in eclipse plugins - and not that important, seam-gen build system is only a starting point, and a projects build requirements quickly outgrow it ftl and other templates --------------------> templates We need to make all templates ftl based - as otherwise inconsistent, and especially hard for multiple consumers when we change a template from one to the other project dependency info --------------------> project dependency info Duplication!!! This is a big pain point atm project structure --------------------------> different project structure Not really an issue generated build.xml ------------------------> generated build.xml Max, does the build.xml generator in jboss tools use the one from seam-gen, or build from scratch? Probably should use the one from seam-gen file copy ----------------------------------> file copy In other words we overwrite rather than merge descriptors icefaces support ---------------------------> Not supported Minor action items ------------------- * Move all templates to .ftl * Tidy up association handling Major design changes proposed ------------------------------ * Move all templates and project dependency info into a JAR - This jar is then published (e.g. to maven), and used by both seam-gen and JBoss Tools - The dependency info is specified using a maven POM, with profiles used to "turn on" options like drools, jbpm etc. - Hibernate Tools uses a classpath like system to load templates so this is easy - Extension points as necessary to allow e.g. icefaces to plugin - Perhaps include a sample build.xml.ftl which can be used for both JBoss Tools and seam-gen - This remains part of the release cycle * Migrate ant control to java control - Extension points as necessary to allow e.g. icefaces to plugin - This becomes a separate module that is released independently of seam as needed * Merge support for descriptors (both JBoss Tools and Seam-gen) * Investigate whether we can utilise maven archetypes (to describe meta data for projects) and consume in both JBoss Tools and seam-gen (already offers dependency info, perhaps merge support, descriptor location info) - N.B. seam-gen would be more than just a maven archetype, but use it as a meta model for the generated project -- Pete Muir http://www.seamframework.org http://in.relation.to/Bloggers/Pete