I’m just started to learn programming and I will learn Java so I can’t help with this low level stuff. I think we need to port swt.jar first, the rest will be easy. Unlike other software wanted to be more cross platform, Eclipse itself now seemed to only focus on Windows and Linux (64 bit only). They no longer package a swt version for Solaris anymore. The Eclipse on FreeBSD/DFBSD port is just an unofficial version. Other BSDs stuck with ancient Eclipse version (3.x). The Illumos based OSes don’t have anything at all. So it’s strange when I asked you to port such software to Haiku. I know it, but Eclipse is, IMHO, just easier to use and learn than Netbeans. I know we can already run the latest version of Netbeans on Haiku but I admit I have never liked Netbeans and many people agreed with me about that. Porting Eclipse to Haiku will attract more Java developers to Haiku. Eclipse also has CDT to develop C/C++, too. It will be another choice for IDE on Haiku.
You are correct, SWT needs to be ported first. It involves a lot of native C code (on Linux it uses GTK, on Windows it uses one of the native Windows APIs). Nothing impossible, but certainly a lot of work, and there are very few apps using SWT, so essentially it would be a lot of work for just one application, which is probably why no one really looked into it yet.
There are many SWT based software, most of them also Eclipse Platform based. Eclipse is not only an Java IDE but also utilized by other to be a platform for many applications. Please have a look at:
So, IMHO, Eclipse is a big plus for the Haiku ecosystem.
I’m not a programmer but just going to take a Java online course so I don’t know about that. I only know the web course also uses VSCode as the editor.
Yes, i use visual studio code too (i make web based code). It is one of the best ides that I have used. But its clear, to have it you have to carry chromium first.
So after all the porting effort will be much more than just porting Eclipse. I myself would prefer the Firefox web browser ported. May be we would not need to port the full Firefox. Just it Web Engine and JS Engine to use them with our Web+ to increase Web+'s standard conformant.
WebPositive uses the WebKit engine from Safari. That engine works fine and is quite standard conformant. It was a lot of work to bring it where it is now, maybe 90% of the work is done. But people keep suggesting that instead of doing the last 10%, we should throw it away and restart with Firefox or Chrome. I think that would be a waste of time.
Please pardon my ignorant. I don’t know that Web+ and Otter using the same engine. Otter just looks more modern to me. I also used to think Otter uses QtWebEngine (which is Chromium based so it’s more standard conformant) rather than QtWebkit.
