Eclipse Equinox, how to configure auto load the bundles in plugin folder

Question

I've followed http://www.eclipse.org/equinox/documents/quickstart-framework.php but it seems to be old and not valid.

There is no such bundles as described org.eclipse.update.configurator_3.2.100.jar

I tried with the org.eclipse.equinox.simpleconfigurator_1.0.200.v20100503, but doesn't work.

Anyone can tell me how to make Equinox auto load the bundles inside plugins folder?

Answer 1

Simplest approach would be to use Apache Felix File Install. It works just fine with Equinox, you only need to put File Install configuration parameters into the configuration/config.ini. Note though that if you launch Equinox via launcher JAR or via binary, the working directory would be parent of configuration/ or plugins/ directory.

Excerpt from our project config.ini:

# Start File Install itself
osgi.bundles=reference\:file\:org.apache.felix.fileinstall_3.1.0.jar@1\:start
# The name of the directory to watch
felix.fileinstall.dir=./plugins
# A regular expression to be used to filter file names
# We have all bundles in plugins/ directory, this regexp
# forbids monitoring bundles that are started via osgi.bundles property
felix.fileinstall.filter=^(?!org.apache.felix.fileinstall|org.eclipse.osgi).*
# Determines if File Install waits felix.fileinstall.poll milliseconds before doing an initial scan or not.
felix.fileinstall.noInitialDelay=true
# Not sure why we have this...
felix.fileinstall.start.level=2

Other possible solution would be to use Eclipse P2. It is much more advanced and powerful, though I find it quite difficult to use.

Good thing is that if your application is agnostic to the way bundles are provisioned (and it should be this way), you can always change your mind later.

Answer 2

In your eclipse installation folder you have the file bundles.info, for example:

eclipse-3.6.1/configuration/org.eclipse.equinox.simpleconfigurator/bundles.info

You can modify the file to add any bundle you want, and also the start level. But the simplest method of adding bundles to an eclipse installation is to add them to the "dropins" folder. This will lead to an automatic modification of the bundle.info file.

Answer 3

Here is the fragment from my automated eclipse installer written in ant.

This installs all features from the custom update site. The code is 'as is', but I sure would have liked to have something like this to guide me when I wrote it.

This script also uses antcontrib extension to ant. Antcontrib tasks are have 'ac:' namespace prefix

Hope this helps.

    <property name="real.eclipse.home" location="${eclipse.home}/eclipse"/>

    <property file="${real.eclipse.home}/configuration/config.ini" prefix="ECLIPSE_CONFIG"/>

    <property name="eclipse-plugins.dir" location="${real.eclipse.home}/plugins"/>

    <path id="newest.equinox.launcher-library.path.id">
      <dirset dir="${eclipse-plugins.dir}">
        <include name="org.eclipse.equinox.launcher.*"/>
      </dirset>
    </path>

    <property name="equinox.launcher-library.full-path" refid="newest.equinox.launcher-library.path.id"/>

    <basename property="equinox.launcher-library.dir" file="${equinox.launcher-library.full-path}"/>

    <echo message="equinox.launcher-library.dir='${equinox.launcher-library.dir}'"/>

    <path id="newest.equinox.launcher.path.id">
      <fileset dir="${eclipse-plugins.dir}">
        <include name="org.eclipse.equinox.launcher_*.jar"/>
      </fileset>
    </path>

    <property name="equinox.launcher.jar" refid="newest.equinox.launcher.path.id"/>
    <basename property="equinox.launcher.jar.basename" file="${equinox.launcher.jar}"/>

    <echo message="equinox.launcher.jar='${equinox.launcher.jar}'"/>

    <java jar="${equinox.launcher.jar}"
      fork="true"
      failonerror="true"
    >
      <arg value="-consolelog"/>
      <arg value="-application"/>
      <arg value="org.eclipse.equinox.p2.director"/>
      <arg value="-repository"/>
      <arg value="http://${repository.server}/custom-update-site"/>
      <arg value="-list"/>
      <redirector
        logError="true"
        outputproperty="features.list"
      >
        <outputfilterchain>
          <linecontains>
            <contains value="feature.group="/>
          </linecontains>
          <replaceregex pattern="(.*feature\.group)=.*$" replace="\1"/>
        </outputfilterchain>
      </redirector>
    </java>

    <ac:for list="${features.list}" delimiter="${line.separator}" trim="true" param="feature">
      <sequential>
        <ac:if>
          <isset property="feature.comma.list"/>
          <then>
            <ac:var name="feature.comma.list" value="${feature.comma.list},@{feature}"/>
          </then>
          <else>
            <property name="feature.comma.list" value="@{feature}"/>
          </else>
        </ac:if>
      </sequential>
    </ac:for>

    <echo message="Found following features to install"/>
    <echo message="${features.list}"/>

    <java jar="${equinox.launcher.jar}"
      fork="true"
      failonerror="true"
    >
      <arg value="-consolelog"/>
      <arg value="-application"/>
      <arg value="org.eclipse.equinox.p2.director"/>
      <arg value="-repository"/>
      <arg value="http://${repository.server}/custom-update-site"/>
      <arg value="-destination"/>
      <arg file="${real.eclipse.home}"/>
      <arg value="-installIU"/>
      <arg value="${feature.comma.list}"/>
      <arg value="-profile"/>
      <arg value="${ECLIPSE_CONFIG.eclipse.p2.profile}"/>
    </java>

P.S. For its usefulness and complexity Eclipse P2 is surely one of the most underdocumented features.