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Tuesday, November 06, 2007

Class Viewer D?

Continuing to think about the next thing for Class Viewer I am coming now to the idea of variations on the theme, where now I'm wondering about a Class Viewer D, where "D" is for Development. The main thing new there would be that along with being able to go to javadocs when you click on a method, you'd be able to open the source code if it is available in your classpath and go directly to that method in the code in a programmer's text editor.

Thing about this idea is that it seems to me that it'd be rather easy to program though now I'd need to bundle a text editor but there are open source ones available, and if they do not allow being opened with a call to a line number, then I'd just add that feature.

That has me thinking then about plug-ins for Class Viewer where I set things up where additional features can be done by other developers as I think about a lightweight development suite around my little program. But that is more the dreaming stuff, as knowing me it's quite possible I'll still be muttering about these things a year from now.

Oh yeah, I'm still pondering the Class Viewer Enterprise variation as well, where Class Viewer is a gateway to any company's codebase, where the opening second screen which is all whitespace now would have some kind of branded welcome and maybe news where it could be on an intranet or the Internet.

I am currently looking a having some ideas really nailed down by June 2008, but may do something sooner if I could get some kind of partnership with funding going.

Without that I think the odds are increasing that Class Viewer D might move forward sometime in Fall 2008, with rapid development, so I'd have something out that fall, but with me there is no telling if I'll change my mind later or not.