Recoder with Eclipse

RECODER is a Java framework aimed at source code analysis and metaprogramming. It works on several layers to offer a set of semi-automatic transformations and tools, ranging from a source code parser and unparser, offering a highly detailed syntactical model, analysis tools which are able to infer types of expressions, evaluate compile-time constants and keep cross-reference information, to transformations of the very Java sources, containing a library of common transformations and incremental analysis capabilities. These make up an useful set of tools which can be extended to provide the basis for more advanced refactoring and metacompiler applications, in very different fields, from code beautification and simple preprocessors, stepping to software visualization and design problem detection tools to adaptive programming environments and invasive software composition. The core system development of RECODER started in the academic field and as such, it was confined into a small platform of users. Although a powerful tool, RECODER framework lacks usability and requires extensive and careful configuration to work properly. In order to overcome such limitations, we have taken advantage of the Eclipse Integrated Development Environment (Eclipse IDE) developed by IBM, specifically its Plugin Framework Architecture to build a tool and a vehicle where to integrate RECODER functionalities into a wide-used, well-known platform to provide a semi-automated and user-friendly interface. In this bachelor thesis we will document how we have integrated RECODER into an Eclipse plug-in to perform a “proof of concept” transformation of an Eclipse Java Project, directly mapping the Eclipse-generated configuration of the project into RECODER's to automate the tedious task of manually configuring RECODER.