With so many active blogs out there the document tips and tricks for JDeveloper and ADF I end up doing a lot of Web searching for technical solution especially when I need to point people to answers on the OTN forum. And while Google does quite a good job here, one thing that we thought would help is a repository of JDeveloper related blog entries and an easy way to search it.
Juan Ruiz from our team has been working on creating such a repository, and I did my little part to help the effort by writing a new extension to JDeveloper.
The concept is simple:
1. While in JDeveloper, go to help->Search blogs... to pop-up a search dialog
2. Put in keywords you want to search
3. Get a list of articles in the log window
4. Click the article to find the solution
Hopefully this will help people locate solution faster.
To install the extension you can use the help->check for updates->open source and partner extension menu option in JDeveloper.
Or, you can download the zip file directly from here, and point the check for updates to your local copy.
Want to enhance the extension?
Here is the source for the extension.
Tips:
1. For the extension to work your JDeveloper needs to be able to access the Internet - so check your tools->preferences->proxy settings
2. Alt+f is defined as an accelerator for this action but it seems to conflict with the short-cut to get to the File menu in some cases. So if you want a short-cut just go to tools->preferences->accelerators and look for the search blogs entry.
Comments (6)
Wow, Shay, this works great and is so handy to use from within JDev. Thanks!
Posted by Pam Gamer | February 20, 2008 11:48 AM
Posted on February 20, 2008 11:48
Can we see if we can modify your extension whilch allows me to search forums ?
Posted by Sudeep | February 21, 2008 7:01 AM
Posted on February 21, 2008 07:01
Feel free to extend the extension to do whatever you want - it should be quite trivial to spawn the code there to do a similar search on the OTN Forum.
Posted by Shay Shmeltzer | February 21, 2008 12:01 PM
Posted on February 21, 2008 12:01
Hi Shay! Great extension!
I have only one minor suggestion: wouldn't it be better if the menu item "Search Blogs..." appeared under the "Edit" menu?
Cheers,
Eduardo.
Posted by Eduardo Rodrigues | March 10, 2008 5:57 PM
Posted on March 10, 2008 17:57
I think of this extension as part of our documentation - so like the other doc related items I placed it under the help.
If you think it would be better off under the Edit - get the source and update it for your own copy :-)
Posted by Shay Shmeltzer | March 10, 2008 6:02 PM
Posted on March 10, 2008 18:02
Hey Shay,
Sorry. When I wrote "Edit" I really meant "Search" menu. But I got your point. I've already changed my copy to show in the 3rd section of the "Search" menu.
Tks!
Posted by Eduardo Rodrigues | March 18, 2008 9:17 AM
Posted on March 18, 2008 09:17