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| <h2>Dependencies page</h2> | |
| <p>The <strong>Dependencies</strong> page shows the dependencies that your plug-in | |
| has on other plug-ins. You must list on this page all the plug-ins that | |
| contribute code required on your plug-in project's classpath to compile. | |
| When you modify the list of dependencies and save the file, PDE will automatically | |
| update your classpath.</p> | |
| <p align="center"> | |
| <img border="0" src="images/plugin-dependencies.png" alt="Dependencies editor page" ></p> | |
| <p align="left"> | |
| </p> | |
| <p align="left"> Note that the order of the plug-ins in the list is important | |
| because it dictates the classloading order at runtime, so use the <strong>Up</strong> | |
| and <strong>Down</strong> buttons to organize the list as appropriate.</p> | |
| <p align="left">A plug-in listed in the <strong>Required Plug-ins</strong> section | |
| can be marked as re-exported in its Properties dialog. Re-exporting a | |
| dependency means that clients of your plug-in will get that dependency for free. | |
| It is important that you do not abuse this functionality and use it only when | |
| it makes sense to do so.</p> | |
| <p align="left">If your plug-in requires a specific version of a plug-in to function | |
| properly, then you can specify the version required along with the version match | |
| rule. You can read more about valid values in the Platform ISV guide.</p> | |
| <p align="left">The Eclipse runtime gives the flexibility to declare a dependency | |
| on a package without explicitly identifying its originating plug-in. These packages | |
| are listed in the <strong>Imported Packages</strong> section.</p> | |
| <p align="left">The <b>Dependency Analysis</b> contain several useful features | |
| such as finding cycles in the dependency graph. Such cycles are forbidden | |
| by the runtime, making the analysis useful for performing a sanity check on your plug-in's | |
| dependency graph before testing it.</p> | |
| <p align="left">For a selected plug-in in the list, <b>Compute Dependency Extent</b> | |
| will give you a list of all the Java types and all the extension points that | |
| your plug-in needs from that dependency. So, in essence, it tells you why | |
| you need that plug-in.</p> | |
| <p align="left">Since the JARs from all the plug-ins in the list of dependencies | |
| will be on your plug-in's classpath at runtime, it is very important to not have | |
| any dependencies that you do not need, as they would slow down classloading. | |
| To find such extraneous entries and remove them, use the <b>Find Unused | |
| Dependencies</b> feature available on this page.</p> | |
| <p align="left"> </p> | |
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