Dr.Bob's JBuilder Machine - JBuilder Programming News, Articles, Books, Reviews and Tools

Delphi Clinic

C++Builder Gate

Training & Consultancy

Delphi Notes Weblog

Dr.Bob's Webshop


	JBuilder 3.0 Foundation #2
See Also:	JBuilder Papers, part #1, part #3 and part #4.

Let's continue our little tour through JBuilder 3 Foundation Edition. Today we will look at some new and improved features, which cannot be found in the older JBuilder versions.

We can now set the visibility of instance variables we add through the Visual Designer. Previously when we used the Visual Designer to add components, the visibility of these variables was package by default. I didn't like this approach, because I always want my variables to be private by default. And when the visibility must be changed I can do it myself.
Now we can customize this behaviour. We can set the visibility to private, package, protected, public. This setting is connected to a project file. We must go to Project | Project properties... and then select the Code Style page. Here we can set the visibility of the variables:

If for example we choose private visibility then every component we add using the Visual Designer will get the private visibility.
It would be even nicer if the wizards for creating new applications would use the same visibility, but the wizards still generate source with variables with package visibility. Something for a new version?

A lot of times it is the little things, which make life easier. And JBuilder 3 FE contains a lot of those little things, which makes programming with Java fun.
For example the new editor options for easier navigation and typing.

The smart key options provide easier navigation and browsing through Java source files. To jump right to the first non-space character of a line we must select the Smart home option. So if we press the Home key, we don't go to the beginning of the line, but to the first non-space character. Especially in lines with spaces at the beginning of the line it is a time saver.
With the Smart end option, we go the first non-space character at the end of the line. And if we select Smart tab option and press the TAB key, we jump to a position of the line, which is beneath the first non-space character of the previous line.

Finally the Enable internation input methods allows the use of keyboards with international characters.

Let's take a look at another time saving category: Indent options. Here we can customize indent behavior of the JBuilder 3 FE editor. If we select Smart indent JBuilder will jump to the position of the first non-space character of the previous line in the new line when we press Enter. So if we have an indented block of code we can simply press Enter and the new line will start right under the beginning of the previous line(s). This feature was already available in the previous versions of JBuilder. But the next option is new:
The Indent after brace option will indent the line following a line which ends with a brace. So automatically the block of code we are typing after a brace will be indented.

We are still not done looking at new features, so stay tuned for part 3 and part 4 of this story, or check out the first impressions.