No worries. I never did find a way to pass properties to the cgen goal in the
plugin, so I ended up experimenting with the plugin source and modified it to
allow specifying system properties from the pom.xml file (in the goal’s
configuration section).
Once the plugin was able to set system properties, it was relatively painless
to get cgen to pick up my new tool using maven (I just had to specify it as a
dependency in the cayenne plugin declaration in my application’s POM)—no need
to muck with classpaths explicitly, thankfully.
After all this, I still can’t find a way to access the metadata from within my
own tool. I am starting to think that it can only be done by supplying the
metadata (e.g. metaDataUtils) from the ClassGenerationAction class.
Thanks again for the pointers.
F
> On May 4, 2020, at 9:56 AM, John Huss <johnth...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Unfortunately I'm not a maven user, so I can't really help here. But
> hopefully someone else could chime in.
>
>> On Sun, May 3, 2020 at 11:39 AM Faizel Dakri <list...@dakri.com> wrote:
>>
>> Hi John,
>>
>> Thank you for the pointers. I didn’t see any way to easily get the
>> metadata into my templates via a custom tool, however I thought it would be
>> a good exercise to figure out how to do it anyway. I’ve tried to follow
>> your advice (as well as looking at the cayenne source), but I’m having
>> difficulty getting my properties file loaded via the
>> org.apache.velocity.tools property.
>>
>> I’m running cgen via my maven build and I can confirm the cgen goal is
>> running (I can see that it is picking up my custom templates), however I’ve
>> been unsuccessful in getting it to pick up my custom properties file where
>> my tool is specified. Is there a sanctioned way of telling the cgen goal
>> about this property? I’ve tried using both the maven properties plugin and
>> passing on the command line, but I have yet to succeed in loading my file.
>> At least it appears unsuccessful. When I debug my maven build, I see that
>> there is an unresolved reference for my tool when velocity is processing my
>> templates.
>>
>> Assuming I’m eventually successful in loading my properties, I have one
>> more question. You mention that any custom velocity tool (and properties
>> files) must be on the class path. I’m assuming that this is the class path
>> in effect while the cgen goal is running. How does one go about altering
>> the class path for a maven plugin? Or does the plugin pickup the project
>> dependencies? (Apologies if this is a basic question, I’m not yet a Maven
>> expert).
>>
>> Thanks again for your help,
>>
>> F
>>
>>
>>>> On Apr 29, 2020, at 02:14 PM, John Huss <johnth...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> I haven't used the metadata / comments yet, so I can't help with that
>>> specifically.
>>>
>>> For the using a custom tool with cgen you need to define a
>>> "tools.properties" file in your class path (I would just put it at the
>>> root) with contents like this:
>>>
>>>
>>> tools.toolbox = application
>>>
>>> tools.application.*myUtils* = com.something.tools.MyCgenUtils
>>>
>>>
>>> The referenced class (and the properties file) needs to be on the class
>>> path when you invoke cgen. The class should contain public instance (not
>>> static) methods in bean-style that work on parts of the DataMap, like an
>>> ObjEntity or a ObjAttribute (or their properties). For example:
>>>
>>>
>>> *public* *boolean* hasReverse(ObjRelationship rel) {}
>>>
>>> Then when you invoke cgen you need to set a system property to point to
>> the
>>> location of your tools.properties file, like this if it is in the class
>>> path root:
>>>
>>> -Dorg.apache.velocity.tools=/tools.properties
>>>
>>>
>>> Your template can reference an instance of your util class using the
>> short
>>> name defined for it in the tools.properties file:
>>>
>>>
>>> ${*myUtils*.getGwtType($attr.Type)}
>>>
>>>
>>> This process has multiple points of failure, so it can be hard to
>>> setup correctly, but hopefully you can get it working.
>>>
>>>> On Wed, Apr 29, 2020 at 11:29 AM Faizel Dakri <list...@dakri.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Hello all,
>>>>
>>>> Being fairly new to Cayenne, this may be an obvious question. I would
>> like
>>>> to know how I can access the metadata stored on an
>>>> attribute/relationship/entity in the datamap from within my velocity
>>>> templates (I think in CayenneModeler, this is how the comment field is
>>>> stored for a datamap item). I think this is the metadata stored via the
>>>> newish InfoExtension facility.
>>>>
>>>> I see that the DataChannelMetaData can be injected into a DataDomain
>> (and
>>>> I’m doing that at runtime in my server app), however I cannot see how to
>>>> get to this metadata from an attribute or relationship or entity in the
>>>> context of a velocity template. Is this possible? I would think it is
>> since
>>>> Modeler is able to read/write those comments, but I am having a hard
>> time
>>>> doing so in a template.
>>>>
>>>> I did see that there is a hook to provide my own tool into the cgen
>> tool.
>>>> Would this be a potential path to look into if the metadata is not
>>>> accessible directly in the templates as is? If so, any pointers on
>> where to
>>>> start?
>>>>
>>>> Thanks for any advice.
>>>>
>>>> F
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Faizel Dakri
>>>> list...@dakri.com
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>
>>
