NetBeans: The Definitive Guide

Appendix A. A Tour of Existing Modules

Many of the modules in NetBeans supply Service Provider Interfaces (SPIs) you can use to implement your functionality much more quickly. A good example of this is the XML set of modules that provides a variety of different types of support for XML.

Also, you may often find yourself implementing functionality that resembles something another module does, and having a template for how to do that is a very good way to avoid making mistakes or reinventing the wheel.

Modules That Expose Functionality You Might Need

While we’ve endeavored to provide a good start for building your own modules for NetBeans, there’s nothing like learning from the experience of someone who has solved the problem you’re facing. And since all of the modules mentioned in this appendix are open source and available in source code form on netbeans.org, there is nothing preventing wholesale borrowing of useful code and techniques from modules that do something you need to do. The following sections provide some useful sources of examples.

The XML Modules

As XML is used more and more in business and computing, it will be more and more common for modules integrating with NetBeans to either use XML internally in one form or another or handle specialized editing or construction of specific types of XML documents. The XML (http://xml.netbeans.org/) project is where to find detailed documentation on these modules. Support for XML in NetBeans is factored into a set of modules that ...