Likes and dislikes

[Franck]

Hello all,

I am sure you've had 1000s of similar posts, but here is my contribution.

Likes: Great look and feel, eclipse integration, XSLT debugger, outline view. All in all a great product which is likely to replace XML spy as my default editor.

Dislikes:
- Title bar shows useless licensing info instead of file/project name.
- Opening files doesn't bring oxygen to the front (or is that the jre 1.5 sp3 problem?)
- The eclipse pluggin and application do not share all their settings. I use both and would like them to stay in sync
- syntax highlighting doesn't differentiates <> from the element name, = from the attribute n, or " ' from the attribute value.
- can't click and drag text/elements from one place to another.
- when creating scenario, no option to use a file opened in the editor. I know the reverse is possible (select a file for a scenario and have it opened) but I tend to work the other way round.
- no copy/paste option on the outline view. I can click an element, it gets highlighted, but I can't copy it from the outline view or the editor itself.

I better stop here or I'll sound ungrateful

[sorin_ristache]

Hello,

Likes: Great look and feel, eclipse integration, XSLT debugger, outline view.

Thank you.

- can't click and drag text/elements from one place to another.

Sure you can:

1. Select an area of text in the editor panel, then move it to other place in the editor panel by dragging and dropping it.

2. Drag a source element and drop it on a target element in Outline view. If before dropping you hold the mouse pointer more than 2 seconds over the target element you will see that the target element is expanded in the Outline view and the source element will be moved between the start tag of the target element and the first child of the target element. If you hold the mouse pointer less than 2 seconds the source element will be moved after the closing tag of the target element.

- no copy/paste option on the outline view. I can click an element, it gets highlighted, but I can't copy it from the outline view or the editor itself.

Sure you can: click an element, it gets highlighted, press CTRL + C or right-click and select Copy from the popup menu.

I better stop here or I'll sound ungrateful

It helps us to improve <oXygen/>

Best regards,
Sorin

[sorin_ristache]

- The eclipse pluggin and application do not share all their settings. I use both and would like them to stay in sync

Before version 6 the user settings were common. Other users asked to separate them because they want different values while using the <oXygen/> Eclipse plugin Also there is a problem if you have both <oXygen/> standalone and the Eclipse platform started. Closing standalone first stores the changes of the settings made in <oXygen/> standalone, then closing the Eclipse platform overwrites them with the changes made in the Eclipse plugin settings. When you start the standalone you will have the changes from the Eclipse plugin.

If you want to use the settings from standalone in the Eclipse plugin just delete the file with the Eclipse plugin settings [user-home-dir]/com.oxygenxml/optionsEc6.0.xml, start Eclipse and the standalone settings will be imported in Eclipse. The same for importing the Eclipse plugin settings in standalone: delete the file [user-home-dir]/com.oxygenxml/optionsSa6.0.xml.

Best regards,
Sorin

[Franck]

If you want to use the settings from standalone in the Eclipse plugin just delete the file with the Eclipse plugin settings [user-home-dir]/com.oxygenxml/optionsEc6.0.xml, start Eclipse and the standalone settings will be imported in Eclipse. The same for importing the Eclipse plugin settings in standalone: delete the file [user-home-dir]/com.oxygenxml/optionsSa6.0.xml.

Now that is clever

[Franck]

Doesn't oxygen understand the xsi:schemaLocation attribute?

I have a full schema underpinning my application configuration files. With XMLSpy I am never typed the node names. I just ctr-space and I get a list of all possible elements/attributes and attribute values, based on the underlying schema, indicated by xsi:schemaLocation.

With Oxygen, having a schema doesn't seem to help me in the least. I have tried xsi:schemaLocation, I have also tried the 'associate schema' option, and the Editor/tag insight/default option. Nothing, all I get is a list of values learnt from what is already in the file. Even worse, if I ctr-space on '<I' I get <I></I> which is an XHTML tag that is invalid in my default namespace!!!

Please tell me that I am doing something wrong!

[sorin_ristache]

Hello,

Please tell me that I am doing something wrong!

Yes you are doing something wrong. Please make sure you have the tag insight assistant enabled in Options - Preferences - Editor / Tag Insight / Features - Use Tag Insight and the assistant will popup automatically when you press < for elements or " for attributes. Also pressing CTRL + SPACE will popup the assistant when there are content completion alternatives at the cursor position. Please see

http://www.oxygenxml.com/inteligent_xml_editing.html

http://www.oxygenxml.com/inteligent_xml_editing.html

If you can't get content completion to work please post small samples of your XML Schema and document.

Best regards,
Sorin

[george]

Hi Frank,

Oxygen sure has a powerfull support for offering content completion proposals based on a schema, it does that for elements, attributes, attribute values and even for element values when they are of simple types.

If the document is reported as valid by the validate action then that should be a good indication that the content completion should also work.

If you still have problems make a small sample schema plus document and send it over to support at oxygenxml dot com.

Best Regards,
George

[Franck]

Likes: Great look and feel, eclipse integration, XSLT debugger, outline view. All in all a great product which is likely to replace XML spy as my default editor.

To that I'd like to add:

- great support through this board and follow up emails. As good if not better than the Clover guys
- switch seamlessly between <A></A> and <A/> just by typing or deleting the / : very smart!

And to clear the record:

- can't click and drag text/elements from one place to another.
- no copy/paste option on the outline view. I can click an element, it gets highlighted, but I can't copy it from the outline view or the editor itself.

The standalone version of Oxygen allows me to do that. My problems were with the eclipse plugin, and to be fair, eclipse doesn't offer the click and drag option in any editor anyway (maybe I'll moan on their boards ). The eclipse outline view doesn't have cut/paste, but has click n drag, so I can't complain

With Oxygen, having a schema doesn't seem to help me in the least. I have tried xsi:schemaLocation, I have also tried the 'associate schema' option, and the Editor/tag insight/default option. Nothing, all I get is a list of values learnt from what is already in the file.

That problem was due to the specific schema I was using, which uses a combination of anonymous type and extensions... And the support team had fixed it before I even raised it, just not released it yet.

Anyway, so far so good, looks like I won't upgrade XMLSpy but switch to Oxygen instead. Pity the support team

[collinsrj]

In the standalone version of <oXygen> the attribute name and the equals sign are the same color; orange. Could they be different colors? Some of my attribute values begin and end with equal signs and it looks a bit confusing. It would seem like a sensible idea to highlight control characters differently; perhaps have the equals sign in blue?

[iulian_velea]

Hi Collin,

For changing the colors used by oXygen to paint the XML syntax please take a look at Preferences/Colors/XML section in the Options Dialog. If you want the equal sign to be blue you will just have to change the color associated with it.
Please let us know if you need some more options regarding the syntax highlight colors.

Best Regards,
Iulian.

[collinsrj]

Thanks Iulian,
That has made reading the XML easier. I guess I would have expected the default to be something different. Orange seems an unusual choice of color for the sign given it's used already.

[Franck]

DE GUSTIBUS ET COLORIBUS NON EST DISPUTANDUM

[DavidPérez]

I have asked this feature in next version of Eclipse, and seems it will be done.

The standalone version of Oxygen allows me to do that. My problems were with the eclipse plugin, and to be fair, eclipse doesn't offer the click and drag option in any editor anyway (maybe I'll moan on their boards ). The eclipse outline view doesn't have cut/paste, but has click n drag, so I can't complain