[DrJava] [ drjava-Ease of use Issues-681808 ] State Everlasting

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Ease of use Issues item #681808, was opened at 2003-02-06 11:57
You can respond by visiting: 
https://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=460211&aid=681808&group_id=44253

Category: Platform Independent
Group: None
Status: Open
Resolution: None
Priority: 5
Submitted By: Peter Centgraf (centgraf)
Assigned to: Nobody/Anonymous (nobody)
Summary: State Everlasting

Initial Comment:
There are a lot of aspects of DrJava that the user can modify during a session, but which are not maintained across sessions.  Many of these things can and should be preserved transparently through the config framework.  I would like to begin tabulating a list of such states, so that they can be gradually implemented as config options.  When posting an idea, it would be helpful to include some comments about potential problems in restoring the state which would need to be checked when doing so.

My initial list:

Interactions history -- the current buffer of recent actions could be spooled to a file, or written out as a big-ass String in the .drjava.  This would allow someone to resume their testing after a crash, for example.  Semantics might be difficult to define when multiple copies of DrJava are being run simultaneously, but the problem isn't unique to this feature.

The current locations of windows and split panes -- these could easily be restored based on the last known coordinates.  There is currently a bug which causes the split panes to revert to their default positioning, which could be fixed when adding this feature.  We should check whether the main window has somehow gotten off-screen and correct it.

Most recent compiler -- restore the previous selection in the Compiler Output tab.  Might revert to the first one (as now) if the previous compiler is no longer available.

Open documents -- restore the last known set of open documents when DrJava was quit.  This may be too ambitious, but it is often handy.  There are lots of potential problems with moved and renamed files, but most can be avoided by just failing to load the document in question. We might be able to restore the last visible portion of the document as well.

Debugger state -- breakpoints and watches are lost when the interactions pane is reset.  Just restoring the debug mode at all after a reset would be a step in the right direction.

Find/Replace -- contents of the search fields and the Match Case toggle could be saved and restored.

That's all I can think of for now.  Please post more as you encounter them.

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You can respond by visiting: 
https://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=460211&aid=681808&group_id=44253