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Platform and Equinox API

Platform Changes
Content-type-specific icons in generic editor An extension was added to the generic editor so that it now can provide icons for content-type. See extension point org.eclipse.ui.genericeditor.icons for more details.

Multiline Support for StringFieldEditor The implementation of StringFieldEditor now provides the option to use a multi-line Text widget, suitable for editing larger String values in a preference page.
API to compute Quick Access proposals according to user input An extension interface org.eclipse.ui.quickaccess.IQuickAccessComputerExtension to use as extension to org.eclipse.ui.quickaccess.IQuickAccessComputer when using extension point org.eclipse.ui.quickaccess/computer was added. This provides the ability to compute a new extra set of proposals whenever filter change.
Bundle org.eclipse.core.runtime no longer reexports javax.inject The org.eclipse.core.runtime bundle had javax.inject as an optional dependency, which it previously reexported, but not anymore.

Technically, it's not a breaking change as javax.inject was never guaranteed to be there thus whether it is reexported or not was not certain. Eclipse Platform can not guarantee the API stability of this package so it makes no sense to make such a promise.

Clients have to Import-Package: javax.inject explicitly if they need it.

E4XMIResource optionally filters Transient UI Elements When using the E4XMIResource directly, transient UI elements are no longer filtered by default. Note that transient UI elements are filtered by default when saved from the application.

To filter transient UI elements, call the save method with the new option options.put(E4XMIResource.OPTION_FILTER_PERSIST_STATE, Boolean.TRUE); resource.save(options);
Simplified Platform logging API Platform provides convenient logging API, Platform.getLog(Class) which can be used to access the log for the bundle to which the class belongs.
Tracing option for correct progress reporting usage Earlier releases added support for tracing the correct usage of progress monitors. Unfortunately, this was missed while documenting in previous noteworthy documents.

To enable this tracing, add org.eclipse.equinox.common/progress_monitors=true in your ".options" file and start Eclipse via the -debug flag, or use the tracing option in the launch configuration.

SWT Changes
New native implementation of ImageLoader on GTK The implementation of ImageLoader on GTK now uses the native GdkPixbuf API for image loading and saving.

Key highlights of the new ImageLoader on GTK:

  • Loading and saving images has native performance, with a significant speedup especially in loading JPEG files
  • Better GIF animation support
  • Support for more image formats
Reduced ToolItem padding on GTK A fix in ToolItem has greatly reduced the size of some toolbars on GTK.

Previously, all ToolItems were the same size as the largest of them in a given toolbar. With this fix, items are now independently sized, which reduces the total size of toolbars that contain large items.

EGit's Rebase Interactive view is a good example of this fix. In the following screenshot, the toolbar shown on top has the fix applied, compared to the larger, unpatched toolbar on the bottom.

ToolItems with reduced padding compared to before
Search/Cancel icons supported in Text widget on Windows The Text widget on Windows now supports displaying the search and cancel icons for SWT.ICON_SEARCH and SWT.ICON_CANCEL styles respectively. With the Windows support added, these style APIs are now supported on all the three platforms and are no longer marked as a HINT.

Text widget with search and clear buttons
API to query if current OS theme is dark A new method public static boolean Display.isSystemDarkTheme() is now available to query if the current OS theme has a dark appearance. The method returns true if the current OS theme is dark, else it returns false.
StyledText now supports a disabled look The StyledText widget now supports a disabled look on all platforms when StyledText.setEnabled(false) is called.

New color constants for disabled widgets Two new color constants are available in SWT, to match the colors used in disabled widgets. SWT.COLOR_TEXT_DISABLED_BACKGROUND matches the background color of a disabled text widget, and SWT.COLOR_WIDGET_DISABLED_FOREGROUND matches the foreground color of a disabled widget.
SWT Snippet Explorer The SWT Snippets project in the SWT repository now includes a simple application called SnippetExplorer which can list, search and launch single or multiple snippets at once. It also shows the snippets description, source code and a preview image where applicable.

Input method switching on GTK Early versions of GTK3 allowed the input method to be changed at the application level. This functionality has been deprecated for quite some time, and has now been removed from SWT.

To change the input method, please use the global input method settings available in the desktop environment.

JFace Changes
New ColumnViewerEditor tab traversal added Tabbing to the start or end of a viewer (during an inline edit) is now possible by passing ColumnViewerEditor.TABBING_CYCLE_IN_VIEWER as a feature when calling TableViewerEditor.create(viewer, editorActivationStrategy, feature) or TreeViewerEditor.create(viewer, editorActivationStrategy, feature).

With this new feature flag enabled:

  • Pressing Tab while editing the last item in a viewer starts an inline edit on the first item.
  • Pressing Shift+Tab while editing the first item starts an inline edit on the last item.

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