Here is a new instance of the OpenOffice.org Eclipse integration tips. I hope you will enjoy it.

Tip #3: Creating a valid OXT extension

The OpenOffice.org Eclipse integration is starting to be out-dated and doesn't support the OXT extensions by default. This tip explains how to create an OXT package using the Eclipse plugin.

The package to build is configured by the package.properties file. When editing this project configuration file, the shown editor is composed of three sections:

• the Package content section: used to select which files should be included in the extension

• the Basic and dialog libraries section: used to add folders containing OOo-Basic libraries to the extension

• the Package descriptions section: used to select text files containing a short description of the package.

An OXT extension contains a description.xml file description the package, its license, its update site, its version, its dependencies... An OpenOffice.org extension is also generally containing an Addons.xcu file describing the different menus and toolbars to add to the OpenOffice.org user interface.

Even if there is no wizard in the Eclipse integration to easily produce these files, they can be hand-written and added to the package. In order to do this, add them to the root of the project and select them in the package.properties file editor. This tip will not explain how to create the Addons.xcu and description.xml files: this is well described in the OpenOffice.org documentation.

• Addons.xcu in the developer's guide

• description.xml in the developer's guide

• BasicAddonBuilder on the wiki

The extension descriptions files are shown when the mouse is over the package in the extensions manager.

To create the package, simply select a file of the project, run the Eclipse export wizard and choose the OpenOffice.org package wizard in the UNO category. In the next step, select 2.0.4 as the minimum version of OpenOffice.org: this will generate an OXT file.

If you have defined a license file for your extension, do not click on Yes when the wizard asks you whether to deploy the extension in OpenOffice.org or not: Eclipse would be waiting indefinitely for a license validation which is not handled by the OpenOffice.org integration.