For a demanding customer and complex project requirements we sometimes need to look beyond the out of the box implementations. In today's fast-paced digital world, users expect applications to be intuitive, responsive, and tailored to their specific needs. That's where custom case page widgets come in. One of the most common extension to Case client is to have new custom page widgets, actions and/or tailoring/extending the existing widget features to their specific needs. By developing specialized widgets, you empower users with modular, intuitive, relevant data at their fingertips, and the flexibility to navigate complex business actions with ease.

CSHS also provides easier way to design UIs and reusable UI components (Coach views) in BAW apps with lots of predefined views. Indeed, the need for custom Case Page Widgets can stem from a variety of reasons, as different systems and use cases demand unique solutions.

Developing custom pagewidgets is very much exciting, as it kicks in the real developerish mentality inside you. By adopting a developerish mentality, you’re not just writing code—you’re solving real-world problems, pushing the boundaries of innovation, and continuously growing. It’s all about the balance between creativity, technical skill, and a relentless pursuit of efficiency and learning.

Initially IBM has provided sample widgets package and also couple of eclipse plugins to generate custom widgets and Navigator plugin based on Apache Ant scripts. I am not sure if there are any new eclipse plugins to create custom widgets project based on Apache Maven, I couldn't find anywhere. It takes time to setup basic maven project and build requirements as per IBM documentation for widgets package.

I thought of developing an eclipse plugin which creates a maven widgets project with a click of a button in eclipse and share with the community. It would be helpful for beginners and also it can save lot of time to setup working maven project for case widgets with some necessary files and sub-module structure in the package. So, here I am providing an eclipse plugin to help your development journey.

Eclipse Plugin works well with the latest eclipse versions, with default settings and configurations like JDK and maven. My Eclipse IDE version used to build and test the plugin: Version: 2024-06 (4.32.0) Build id: 20240606-1231

How to use the plugin:

1. Download the plugin from github or attachment in this community library.
2. Deploy the plugin jar file into dropins directory in eclipse installation path.
3. Start/Restart the eclipse.
4. ICM menu should be visible in the eclipse main toolbar, on clicking the menu there will be an option to Create Case Widgets Maven project. CTR+9 shortcut key also will work for this menu action.
5. Enter the project name in the dialog.
6. Wait for project creation and you will get success message dialog once done.
7. Open the pom.xml inside the Plugin project and provide navigatorAPI jar dependency as per your local maven repository.
8. Necessary files have been created by default, you can modify them or directly start adding new custom widgets/actions without wasting time.

Enjoy customizing the BAW Case client!

Feel free to let me know your suggestions and comments.

Regards,

Ramesh Bhat

#BAW #Case #Custom #Widgets