Development Lifecycle

If you are developing a module which relies on custom code you probably use an IDE like Eclipse, Idea or NetBeans. You probably also use the synchronization feature of OpenCms to synchronize your changes in the IDE with the OpenCms VFS.

This module development lifecycle has several phases:

1. Edit Files in the IDE
2. Synchronize to copy changes made in the IDE to the VFS
3. Publish. You must publish if you changed
   • a Java class or a Java classpath resource (/system/module/yourmodule/classes/)
   • a Java library (/system/module/yourmodule/lib/)
   • another resource which needs to be exported (e.g. in /system/workplace/resources/tools/yourtool/icons. They get exported to /resources in the Webapp folder).
4. Reload OpenCms or reinitialize the Workplace. You do not need to do this if you changed JSP files. They are reloaded automatically. However, you have to reload whenever you change
   • a Java class or a Java classpath resource
   • a Java library
5. Test changes

If you develop a tool and your changes did not involve classpath relevant files it might suffice to reinitialize the Workplace (this function is available under Administration/Workplace Tools) instead of reloading OpenCms completely.