Build Your own vs. Extending IDE

[srl295]

Hi! I'm trying to evaluate the difference between the approaches in:

1. https://theia-ide.org/docs/composing_applications/
2. https://theia-ide.org/docs/blueprint_documentation/

It seems like #1 is "running the Theia IDE, but with your own specific set of plugins",
where #2 is "fork the Theia IDE (which is the top level gluing the components together) and customize it".

Do I have that right? It seems like #2 is the right way to do branding, where #1 has limited options for updating the brand.

I'm evaluating this for writing a custom editor for our application's data.

Thanks!

[msujew]

Hey @srl295,

Generally, both are simply a starting point from where you can create your own IDE. In theory, using #2 you can get a custom branded fully-featured IDE in <30 minutes. It comes with a bunch of nice-to-haves (auto-updater, a sensible default plugin selection, dockerfile, electron build etc.) and runs out of the box.

However, a lot of adopters go with #1, because it offers the most flexibility from the start. It's not about using the "Theia IDE", but actually building your own IDE based on the Theia framework (this repository). That's how most adopters use Theia, see the Arduino IDE or Mbed Studio by ARM.

In the end, it doesn't matter too much which option you pick, since most of the features come from the underlying Theia framework anyway. Theia IDE just puts some nice-to-haves on top.

[srl295]

Maybe src-gen/backend/main.js ?

[msujew]

I see, yeah the Theia CLI basically takes a look into the contributed dependencies (including your own) and figures out what to include into the app by looking at the package.json. The data in there is generated into the src-gen folder to then build a JavaScript artifact that includes any Theia extension.

[srl295]

OK. So if I wanted to do #1 like arduino, how would I get started generating that electron-app or applications/electron directory?

1. is there a guide to building that?
2. do I copy from src-gen?
3. do I copy from the blueprint and customize it (which is sort of like #2)?
4. something else?

THanks!

[msujew]

I would recommend starting with the yeoman generator (also linked in here) which does all of that project setup for you. No need to dive into the inner workings of the CLI :)

[srl295]

@msujew it is linked there, but it says:

This guide describes the manual steps to build a Theia-based product, there are two ways to avoid this manual set-up…

However, the guide that follows doesn't discuss those generated files- it implies that the guide is equivalent to running the generator.. Maybe a sentence contrasting the generator to the guide would help?

It could go at the very end of https://theia-ide.org/docs/composing_applications

[JonasHelming]

@srl295 Good feedback! Would you mind creating an issue here and describing the mismatch or missing info a bit more in detail? Feedback like this is super important, I will try to address this!

[srl295]

It's a little related to eclipse-theia/theia-website#85 - do you want a new issue or comments there?

[JonasHelming]

New dedicated one would be better I think. Please note that we are about to deprecate/remove the manual json file approach in favor of the Yeoman generator as it is easier to maintain and more conveniant

[srl295]

Thanks I appreciate that, at this point I think I’m getting more comfortable using the blueprint like a cookbook that is a source of ideas, I guess it depends upon how you cook…

[srl295]

OK, some thoughts on going from the generator to the blueprint… There's a lot of stuff in the blueprint… For example, do I really want an updater that will update my app to the stock version? I think more documentation on how the blueprint was put together would be helpful , for example, it's not clear if I should add another extension to the extensions directory or add a new directory for my own extensions.

[JonasHelming]

So you mean a guide "From a simple app/extension to adopting Theia IDE as a blueprint"?