Re: Features brainstorming

Tim Lebedkov wrote:

[all known relies merged]

>>next release planning is behind door so I'd
>>like to gather your input (including flashback).
>>
>>Do not feel limited by following questions:
>>
>>  - What's top priority feature you would like to see
>>    in next (>NB 3.6) tasklist version?
>>
> make suggestions a part of the standard build
>
> Stable & supported Suggestions view and PMD suggester, heavily tested
> for keyboard usage (F12/S-F12, and rapid file switching).

You both rate the same feature highest priority. 

What particular suggestions do you use most often?

Background: some needs PMD presence (an extra parser) others
can be derived from exiting results of background processing
(java/srcmodel or mdr). I think that existing PMD suggestions
should be reimplemented over existing parser results to
get reasonable performance.

>>  - How does tasklist tool window concept suit your
>>    workflow?
>>
> Suggestions view is too dynamic for me. I always set the "on edit delay"
> to something like 1 min.
> Hopefully TTV will be rewritten and it solves the problem.
>
> Suggestions view fits my workflow well although I would often want to
> see suggestions with the Source Editor maximized, which seems to be
> impossible with the current window system.

It looks like suggestions view is flickering. Still Jesse
prefers the live view over scanned one. Besides how would
you like live suggestions view for all opened documents?

>>  - What suggestions do you expect in tasklist view?
> 
> - pmd submodule is very useful
> - I also wrote a i18n submodule that checks not internationalized
> strings in the code.
>
> To-do comments, PMD violations, Javadoc problems, missing/old
> copyrights; perhaps Java compilation errors.

You mentioned wide spectrum of suggestions. I'm surprised Tim
have written i18n suggestions. Tim, you could integrate them into
i18n module to share settings and logic. Start with eager module.
Another usefull (at lest for me) suggestion type could be spelling
suggestions.

>>  - What suggestions do you expect directly in editor?
>>
> All of them should be duplicated in the editor.
>
> Not sure what that means exactly. Annotation icons? For everything
> (except perhaps missing copyrights).

Again unison reply. I saw this in IDEA where once you
get at line with suggestion an icon at the beginning of
the line is displayed then you either type Alt+Enter to
see&fix the problem or ignore.

>>  - What current 'feature' do you dislike (or hate)?
>>
> TTV :-)
>
> I dislike the mandatory categorization of suggestions; would prefer to
> see them all, regardless of type, sorted by line #. Simpler to navigate.
> 
> Would prefer having the option to get rid of most of the GUI stuff in
> Suggestions window (even the table header); takes up too much space, and
> is all available in the context menu anyway. Just want to see type
> icons, messages, and line numbers, nothing else.

You are power users! Novice would never discover even minimal
features with this approach. To Jesse you can sort by line now
(AFAIK it should be fixed and F12 navigation respects sorting,
however not sure is sorting option persists).

>>  - Do you prefer explicit actions (Scan for Suggestions,
>>    I18N wizards, Compiler output, ...) or background
>>    hints (Suggestions, error highlighting in editor).
>>  
>>
> both. I think the current To Do window is a very good compromise.
> 
> Usually prefer background hints.

I like subset of background hints directly in editor (missing import)
otherwise scanned ones.

>>  - What related tools do you use? Why?
>>
>>  - ...
>>
> - After the rewrite of the build system something like compiler submodule
>   would make a lot of sense.

To catch up you need to talk to java guys directly. 

> - paint error marks directly on the editor's  scrollbar as IntelliJ Idea
> does
>     (Tim Boudreau's module already does this).

Yes, it's probably good candidate to Annotation API enhancement
to introduce a flag marking annotations suitable only for the strip
only unless caret stays near to annotated line.

> - After the java/mdr module is ready we could use it to generate
> suggestions

Definitely.

Thank you. I try to incorporate it into my future plans (it's
now supported by customers feedback :-). I will publish these
plans soon to keep you informed and cooperate.

  Once again thanks.
  Cc.

-- 
<address>
<a href="mailto:[email protected]">Petr Kuzel</a> at Sun Microsystems :
<a href="http://www.netbeans.org/">NetBeans Java IDE</a></address>