'merging with a say it smart plugin' app specific vs. global

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Created by: Janine Graves on 18-08-2008 10:21:48 PM
Can someone please help me sort thru the example from the old Audium training days, regarding 'extending' the date say it smart to display a new input format (Java Calendar Object).

In that example, it didn't just 'extend' the existing date SIS, it had Studio 'merge' the new input format with the original data SIS, by giving the extended class that same real and display name in Studio.

The extended class is called NewDateInputFormat, but its 'real' and 'display' name are the same as the original Date SIS class.

What I discovered was that if the java class for the 'NewDateInputFormat ' SIS class in my application/deploy/java/app/classes/ folder, then when I deployed the app from studio, the 'run time code' that Studio creates points to the NewDateInputFormat SIS ONLY if the user selected the new input format (Java Calendar). And that if I selected a different 'input' (mmddyyyy for example) that was part of the original SIS class, then Studio called the original Date SIS (not mine).

OK, that was understandable.

BUT - Here's where I got confused. If I moved the NewDateInputFormat class outside of the app, and made the SIS class global (so that it would show up in every application I created in Studio) by putting it into eclipse/plugins/com.audiumcorp.studio.lib.common/classes, and restarted Studio, then no matter which input format I selected for the date, the runtime files ALWAYS pointed to MY NewDateInputFormat SIS.

Can you help me sort out (or rationalize) what's happening? I'll attach the original java sample here, but I assume that you wrote it, since it comes from the old Audium training samples.

I'll paste the code below:

/**
* This Say It Smart plugin is designed to demonstrate the process by which one
* can create a Say It Smart plugin that expands an existing Say It Smart
* plugin. The advantage of this is that with not a lot of extra code, a
* developer can add to existing plugins that show up merged in Audium Builder
* for Studio without having to access the code of the base plugin. In this
* manner developers can add input formats, output formats, and filesets. They
* can even change some of the input parameters to the base plugin.
* Additionally, with Say It Smart plugins being simple Java classes, a plugin
* need not actually extend the Say It Smart class it needs it can simply
* instantiate it just like any other class.
*
* In this example, a new Say It Smart plugin is created that adds an input
* format to the date type, which is handled by the AudiumSayItSmartDate plugin.
* The input format supports the use a Java Calendar object passed as input
* rather than a String. All it does is create a plugin that acts as if it has
* a single input format but with the same real name as the date plugin. This
* is important because then Audium Builder for Studio will "merge" the existing
* AudiumSayItSmartDate plugin with this one, making them seem as one. All this
* plugin need deal with is handling the new input format. When it handles that,
* all it actually does is convert the data appropriately and create and
* instance of AudiumSayItSmartDate to actually do the work.
*/
public class NewDateInputFormat extends SayItSmartBase implements SayItSmartPlugin
{
/* We define the constants holding the real name, display name, and
description of the new input format. */
public static final String JAVA_DATE_INPUT_FORMAT = "java_date";
public static final String JAVA_DATE_INPUT_FORMAT_DISPLAY = "Java Calendar Object";
public static final String JAVA_DATE_INPUT_FORMAT_DESCRIPTION = "This input format supports a Java Calendar object passed as input versus a String containign the date.";

/* We create an instance of AudiumSayItSmartDate because we need it to
access information and to actually take care of most of the work for us. */
public AudiumSayItSmartDate datePlugin = new AudiumSayItSmartDate();

/**
* This method only defines this plugin's information, which is the new
* input format and output formats and filesets already defined in the
* AudiumSayItSmartDate plugin. We use the instance of AudiumSayItSmartDate
* to return the information for these output formats and filesets. It is
* important that we give this plugin the same real name (and display name
* too) as the AudiumSayItSmartDate plugin type's real name otherwise the
* Builder will not merge the two plugins. We still have to define an output
* format and filesets even though we are just reusing the ones from
* AudiumSayItSmartDate because a plugin must define the dependencies
* correctly.
*/
public SayItSmartDisplay getDisplayInformation() throws SayItSmartException
{
SayItSmartDisplay toReturn = new SayItSmartDisplay("date", "Date", "This plugin adds to date with a new input format");
toReturn.addInputFormat(JAVA_DATE_INPUT_FORMAT,
JAVA_DATE_INPUT_FORMAT_DISPLAY,
JAVA_DATE_INPUT_FORMAT_DESCRIPTION);
toReturn.addOutputFormat(datePlugin.STANDARD_OUTPUT_FORMAT,
datePlugin.STANDARD_OUTPUT_FORMAT_DISPLAY,
datePlugin.STANDARD_OUTPUT_FORMAT_DESCRIPTION);
toReturn.addFileset(datePlugin.FULL_DATE_FILESET_STANDARD,
datePlugin.FULL_DATE_FILESET_STANDARD_DISPLAY,
datePlugin.FULL_DATE_FILESET_STANDARD_DESCRIPTION);
toReturn.addFileset(datePlugin.FULL_DATE_FILESET_ENHANCED,
datePlugin.FULL_DATE_FILESET_ENHANCED_DISPLAY,
datePlugin.FULL_DATE_FILESET_ENHANCED_DESCRIPTION);

return toReturn;
}

/**
* Here, we simply report the dependencies between the new input format and
* the output format.
*/
public SayItSmartDependency getFormatDependencies() throws SayItSmartException
{
return new SayItSmartDependency(JAVA_DATE_INPUT_FORMAT, datePlugin.STANDARD_OUTPUT_FORMAT);
}

/**
* Here, we simply report the dependencies between the output format and the
* filesets. We get this information straight from how the
* AudiumSayItSmartDate defines them.
*/
public SayItSmartDependency getFilesetDependencies() throws SayItSmartException
{
return new SayItSmartDependency(datePlugin.STANDARD_OUTPUT_FORMAT, new String[] {
datePlugin.FULL_DATE_FILESET_STANDARD,
datePlugin.FULL_DATE_FILESET_ENHANCED});
}

/**
* The filesets have not changed, all we did is change how the input comes
* in as. Therefore, we simply return whatever the AudiumSayItSmartDate
* object returns.
*/
public String[] getFilesetContents(String fileset) throws SayItSmartException
{
return datePlugin.getFilesetContents(fileset);
}

/**
* All we need to do is convert the Calendar object to a String after which
* point we call the convertToFiles method of our AudiumSayItSmartDate
* object to do the work. Its as simple as that!
*/
public SayItSmartContent convertToFiles(Object dataAsObject, String inputFormat, String outputFormat, String fileset) throws SayItSmartException
{
/* Convert Object to Calendar. if there is a ClassCastException, we
throw an exception because it is not a Calendar object. */
Calendar theDate = null;
try {
theDate = (Calendar) dataAsObject;
} catch (ClassCastException e) {
throw new SayItSmartException("SayItSmartDate addon Error - The Java object passed as input for the input format \"" +
JAVA_DATE_INPUT_FORMAT_DISPLAY + "\" is not a Calendar object.");
}

/* We get the components of the date. Note that the month is zero based
so we add 1. */
String dateAsString = "";
int month = theDate.get(Calendar.MONTH) + 1;
int day = theDate.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_MONTH);
int year = theDate.get(Calendar.YEAR);

/* We have to pad with zeros if any of the components are not long
enough. */
if (month < 10) {
dateAsString += "0";
}
dateAsString += month;

if (day < 10) {
dateAsString += "0";
}
dateAsString += day;

if (year < 10) {
dateAsString += "000";
} else if (year < 100) {
dateAsString += "00";
} else if (year < 1000) {
dateAsString += "0";
} else if (year > 9999) {
year = 9999;
}
dateAsString += year;

/* Now that we've converted, we let the super class' method do all the
work. */
return datePlugin.convertToFiles(dateAsString, "mmddyyyy", outputFormat, fileset);
}

/**
* This method shows some possible calendar objects that can be passed and
* what they return.
*/
public static void main(String[] args) throws SayItSmartException
{
NewDateInputFormat newPlugin = new NewDateInputFormat();
AudiumSayItSmartDate datePlugin = new AudiumSayItSmartDate();

GregorianCalendar current = new GregorianCalendar();
System.out.println("\nData: The Present Date\nResult = " +
newPlugin.convertToFiles(current, NewDateInputFormat.JAVA_DATE_INPUT_FORMAT,
datePlugin.STANDARD_OUTPUT_FORMAT,
datePlugin.FULL_DATE_FILESET_STANDARD));

GregorianCalendar aDate = new GregorianCalendar(954, 0, 1);
System.out.println("\nData: 01010954\nResult = " +
newPlugin.convertToFiles(aDate, NewDateInputFormat.JAVA_DATE_INPUT_FORMAT,
datePlugin.STANDARD_OUTPUT_FORMAT,
datePlugin.FULL_DATE_FILESET_STANDARD));

aDate = new GregorianCalendar(1999, 11, 31);
System.out.println("\nData: 12311999\nResult = " +
newPlugin.convertToFiles(aDate, NewDateInputFormat.JAVA_DATE_INPUT_FORMAT,
datePlugin.STANDARD_OUTPUT_FORMAT,
datePlugin.FULL_DATE_FILESET_STANDARD));

aDate = new GregorianCalendar(38464, 3, 12);
System.out.println("\nData: 04129999\nResult = " +
newPlugin.convertToFiles(aDate, NewDateInputFormat.JAVA_DATE_INPUT_FORMAT,
datePlugin.STANDARD_OUTPUT_FORMAT,
datePlugin.FULL_DATE_FILESET_STANDARD));

aDate = new GregorianCalendar(2020, 10, 3);
System.out.println("\nData: 11032020\nResult = " +
newPlugin.convertToFiles(aDate, NewDateInputFormat.JAVA_DATE_INPUT_FORMAT,
datePlugin.STANDARD_OUTPUT_FORMAT,
datePlugin.FULL_DATE_FILESET_STANDARD));
}
}