SetUpEclipseForPlugin

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Setting up Eclipse for plug-in development

This page is intended for people who want to develop their own plug-in (e.g., tab widget, slot widget, project plug-in, etc.) and who use Eclipse as their Java development environment. This is a step-by-step guide that shows the setup of the Eclipse environment using screen shots. We will use as an example the scenario in which a developer wants to create a tab widget that displays "Hello World!". These steps can be used for developing any plug-in type.

Prerequisites

Before we start, make sure that you have the latest version of Protege 3.x and Eclipse installed.

  1. Download and install Eclipse from here.
  2. Download and install latest version of Protege 3.x from here. Let's say you have installed Protege in:


Setting up Eclipse

Step 1. Create a new Java Project

Start Eclipse. Go to File Menu -> New -> Project -> Select Java Project. Click Next. In the next panel choose a project name, say "HelloWorldTab". The screen should look like below:


Eclipse plugin new project.png


Click Finish. Congratulations! You have created an empty Java project. Your screen should look like:


Eclipse plugin empty project.png


Step 2. Configure the project build path

This step assumes that you have Protege 3.x installed on your computer. This example assumes that Protege was installed in /work/protege/Protege_3.4 (On Windows machines, the default installation directory would be something like C:\Program Files\Protege_3.4)

Select the project name, HelloWorldTab', right click, select Build Path -> Configure Build Path.... Switch to the Libraries tab. You should see an something like this:


Eclipse plugin Config build path empty.png


Click on Add External JARs... and go to the Protege installation directory. Select from there the:

  • protege.jar
  • looks-2.1.3.jar (version may vary)

Click OK.

If your plug-in is for OWL, you will need to include also all the jars in the protege-owl plug-in folder. Repet the same operation: Click Add External Jars, go to the Protege installation directory/plugins/edu.stanford.smi.protegex.owl and select all the jar files in that directory.

Note If your plug-in depends on other plug-ins (e.g., on the Change Management plug-in), then you need to add to the build path also all the jars in that plug-in folder.

After adding the protege jars (and the protege-owl jars), the Library tab should look like:


Eclipse plugin config build path.png