NESCDT

This is a short description of how to use and develop the nescdt plugin. It is an editor for working with nesC code within Eclipse (as an alternative to other editors). Fundamentally, you just create a new project in Eclipse and link those folders from your TinyOS installation and your application tree that are needed. The plugin then scans the linked source code and uses this for auto-completion. Built-in keywords (which you can change (see Development section)) are used for syntax highlighting. The plugin does not touch, nor does it compete with your build system: you still build your applications with make in whatever way you do it today.

Using the nescdt TinyOS plugin for Eclipse

A basic nesC editor plugin for TinyOS-2.x using Eclipse with syntax highlighting and .nc file content detection for the follow types (the same symbols are used as in nesdoc):

• interface ,
• module ,
• generic module ,
• configuration ,
• generic configuration
• safe (experimental).

Installing

The source is included in the plugin jar file, and it is possible to refine it (see the Development section). To install the plugin:

• Version 0.0.14: First download the nescdt_0.0.14.jar file [here]
• Save it in the root of Eclipse plugin directory (where the other (jar) plugins also reside), and delete the previous version of this plugin if you have it. It would usually be c:\eclipse\plugins on a Windows machine.
• Restart Eclipse (perhaps verify for yourself that it is installed: Help->About Eclipse SDK->Plug-in Details)

Using the Plugin

• Associate the *.nc files with this editor: Windows->Preferences->General->Editors->File Associations

• Create a new empty project and name it what you want to (for example nescsampleproject)
• Create a new folder in the project (right-click on the project) and name it what you want to
• Import and link to the part of the TinyOS tree or your own code(right-click on the nescsampleproject folder and press import)

• Choose the Link to folder in the file system option and proceed (this will not change your TinyOS code at all and it will not copy any files on your computer)
• When you are done the Eclipse IDE could look something like this (note that the content of the files have been analyzed and that the icons reveal that we have some configurations, generic configurations, modules, and generic modules in the mica2 folder):

• When you open some .nc file it will be syntax colored (according some some predefined rules in the plugin):

• There is autocompletion for keywords and types. Press CTRL + SPACE to get the suggestions

Then select (if there is more than one choice) and press ENTER to insert the word

Side notes

• • The nescdt plugin is < 50 kB
  • (Experimental) If it detects safe code (looking for @safe, *COUNT, *SIZE, or *SAFE) a rhombus shape is added to the icon. A safe module could look like this in the file navigator (note that a little rhombus has been added to the module icon).
  • If the CVS decorators annoy you (if, for example, another CVS client than Eclipse is being used), then turn them off from Window->Preferences->General->Appearance->Label Decorations.
  • You can also consider downloading the CDT plugin for editing header files and perhaps C files in Eclipse. Enter the http://download.eclipse.org/tools/cdt/releases/europa as a new Remote site in the Eclipse update manager and choose the CDT main plugin:

Developing/Debugging on the NESCDT Plugin

To develop, customize, or debug the nescdt plugin, you can follow the guide below. In a best-case scenario it would be completed in 15-30 min.

The immediate places for personal enhancement/customization of the nescdtplugin are:

• Change keywords coloring (go to INescColorConstants.java)
• Add or remove items in the keywords list (go to NescKeywords.java)
• Control which words included in the auto-completion scanner (go to the method parseLine in NescParser.java)
• Change the icons used for nc files and type visualization (go to the icons folder)

Importing

Here we start with a blank Eclipse. You can get a new workspace (if you want to) by creating a shortcut and starting Eclipse with a command line similar to this:

C:\eclipse\eclipse.exe -data -consolelog C:\Dokumenter\eclipse\workspace-plugin 

The consolelog makes it possible to see System.out.println from the plugin itself (it is cheating, but useful during development).

Assuming that you have downloaded the plugin (see start of this wiki page) it is now the time to import it into Eclipse for development. Press Import:

Select Plug-ins and Fragments:

Important: Choose Projects with source folders:

Select the nescdt plugin in the version you happen to have:

Debugging

To show how easy it is to change it, look at the following example. It is code that splits the contents of a .nc file into string tokens:

Try to place a breakpoint by double-clicking on the bar to the left of the code that you want to inspect. Then click on the meny to debug an Eclipse Application. It is a second Eclipse instance that will be launched running the imported version of the plugin (not the plugin you downloaded into the ECLIPSEHOME/plugin folder):

It will then look like this when you have the two instances of Eclipse running:

To create a new version of the plugin please double click on the plugin.xml file in the project. Then select the Export Wizard:

Check the src folder for export when doing a binary build (so you export the source code with the plugin and makes it possible for others to do what you are doing now):

Exporting

Then export the plugin to the ECLIPSEHOME/plugin directory (it will run next time Eclipse is restarted). It is best to delete the old plugin file (such as nescdt_0.0.12.jar) and change the increment the version number of the new plugin :

Finally verify that the plugin jar file is in the plugin directory as expected:

Contact

If you have some light-weight suggestions for improvements: rup.inf(at)cbs.dk