Package org.java.plugin

This package contains framework runtime API.

See:
Description

Interface Summary

PathResolver	This interface is intended to establish correspondence between relative path and absolute URL in context of plug-in or plug-in fragment.
PluginManager.EventListener	Plug-ins life-cycle events callback interface.
PluginManager.PluginLocation	Simple callback interface to hold info about plug-in manifest and plug-in data locations.

Class Summary

ObjectFactory	Factory class to help creating base Framework objects: plug-in registry, path resolver and plug-in manager.
Plugin	This is base for "home" class of plug-in runtime.
PluginClassLoader	Extension to Java class loader API.
PluginManager	JPF "runtime" class - the entry point to the framework API.
PluginManager.EventListenerAdapter	An abstract adapter class for receiving plug-ins life-cycle events.

Exception Summary

JpfException	Base JPF exception class that supports localized error messages.
PluginLifecycleException	Exception class that indicates errors during plug-in life cycle.

Package org.java.plugin Description

This package contains framework runtime API.

The JPF consists of three major parts:

• Plug-in registry - the storage for meta information about all discovered plug-ins
• Path resolver - the component, which knows all about where things are physically located
• Plug-in manager - the framework runtime that loads and activates plug-ins

Plug-in registry is a set of interfaces that abstract whole meta information about plug-ins and plug-in fragments. The framework provides standard implementation for these interfaces that is based on concept of plug-in manifest as a special XML syntax file, created according to plug-in DTD. But in any case, the general rule is that manifest should be registered with plug-in registry for every plug-in and plug-in fragment.

The framework also provides standard implementation of path resolver, which just maps plug-in manifests to context ("home") folder of corresponding plug-ins.

To get instances of any base Framework classes, use special factory class that knows what implementation classes to load for plug-in registry, manager and path resolver. For example, you can get instance of plug-in manager just in one method call. This makes usage of JPF very simple in most situations.