How to run the activiti source code?

[balaji1]

Hi,

1. We have checked out the source code from SVN and installed in SVN.
Can you please tell us how to build this source code?

ALso what will be the outcome of this process?

2. We have proposed to use activiti plugin for our porject. We need to customise the palette shapes and XML tags. Can you please tell us the process to perform.


Please help us to resolve to above issues. We are badly stuck up here.

[balaji1]

Hi,

Please clarify the below questions:

1. This is regarding license.
Can we make changes to activiti source code or do we need to create extension points
to the source and make changes?
Because, we can see some copyright labels in the java files.


2. We just created our own Export MArshaller project on top of your framework.We dont want to lose any of the
core functionality.Suppose if I want to have my own menu "Export as MyXML" along with the present "Export Menu" which are the files we need to traverse to make it happen. For this purpose, DO we need to add any extension points or need to touch any existing code.

[tiesebarrell]

IANAL, but AFAIK you can make changes if you need to. I would advise to use the extension points where available, though, because code base changes from 1.0 will consider stable extension points, but may break your own changes.

[balaji1]

HI,
TO add my question to above reply,

. We just created our own Export MArshaller project on top of your framework.We dont want to lose any of the
core functionality.Suppose if I want to have my own menu "Export as MyXML" along with the present "Export Menu" which are the files we need to traverse to make it happen. For this purpose, DO we need to add any extension points or need to touch any existing code.

[tiesebarrell]

Not really. If you want to add to the menu generated by Activiti Designer, you're best off changing our code or somehow subclassing (not sure that would be trivial though). If you're just interested in adding to the general menus, you should look into writing your own Eclipse plugin (base information is here: http://www.vogella.de/articles/EclipseExtensionPoint/article.html) that uses the default Eclipse extension points for menus (take a look here: http://www.vogella.de/articles/EclipseCommands/article.html). Then to access your ExportMarshaller, you can query the Eclipse registry for extensions on our extension point and invoke your ExportMarshaller from there. If you take a look in our org.activiti.designer.eclipse.ui.ActivitiDiagramEditor class, there's code that does exactly that in the getActiveMarshallers() method.

[balaji1]

Hi,
As a first step we have planned to do following implementation.

We just created our own Export Marshaller project on top of your framework.We dont want to lose any of the
core functionality.I want to have my own menu "Export as MyXML" along with the present "Export Menu". After clicking it shouid create the XML File.

Can you please tell the sequence of steps to be followed to perform the same.

[balaji1]

Hi,
Can anyone please reply back to the above question.

THanks

[tiesebarrell]

Balaji,

I believe I already answered the question by providing the two links above and a pointer to where we perform the same code. If you're looking for more general help on developing Eclipse plugins, you should probably search the web for some tutorials or take a look at the eclipsepedia pages such as this one: http://wiki.eclipse.org/Category:FAQ

[balaji1]

HI Tiese,
I did the following steps:

1. Created a copy of the project (export.bpmn20) and made corresponding changes to build
it using maven.

2. Have added a new menu in GUI project to export XML.

3. Have created extension points from  design.eclipse to that duplicate copy of the project(export.bpmn20).

4. Have modified some tags in the duplicate copy of the project.

But still I cant see my change.

Thanks

[tiesebarrell]

Balaji,

have you made sure your XML returns a different filename than the original bpmn20 export? Otherwise it might be overwriting the same file. Also, you probably need to check the marshaller in the preferences so it's executed on save.

[balaji1]

HI,

I had a look at the ActivitiToolBehaviorProvider.java in gui project.

Is this the logic to save the file in XML format?
Or exactly where do we need to make sure XML returns a different name.