Jambi Generator Docs (was: PDF Viewing Support (poppler-qt4))

[Adam Batkin]

> The Qt 4.4 Jambi version of the will have extended support for 
> namespaces. We've implemented quite a bit there in order to properly 
> support the Phonon API's so that part should not be an issue in the future.

That's good to hear.

> As for the complexity of the generator... Did you start with the 
> generator example and try to go incrementally from there? Mapping an API 
> is not a trivial task, but if there are concrete missing parts of the 
> docs we would like to hear a bit more about them.

Actually, maybe the generator is simpler than I thought, but the 
provided example is a bit complex for "beginners". Many things became 
suddenly clear once I created a few simple classes for myself, just to 
play around with, and ran them through the generator. That was my key to 
enlightenment.

Here's the thing: If you look at the regular Qt and Qt Jambi examples, 
starting with the tutorials, you become spoiled. The examples and 
tutorials are well explained, well documented, and most importantly, 
they generally highlight only a single bit of functionality. If you want 
to verify that everything is installed properly in your development 
environment, paste in the code from Example 1 (it's only 6 lines). If 
you forgot how to deal with the Item View framework, look at the Item 
View examples. Etc...

So what would be nice is concrete examples of how to deal with specific 
issues when using the generator or interfacing with native libraries. In 
particular (but also as an example of what I'm looking for (a little 
voice in my head that I haven't heard since I was in school warns me not 
to let you actually do all of my work for me))...Something like "here's 
an example program with 2 classes, Parent and Child, and you obtain a 
Child by calling parent.getChild() but the parent can't be GC's until 
all of the children also have no references remaining."

> If you're not using the generator you can still "steal" some of the 
> logic in it ;-). We have quite a bit of utility functionality that is 
> used from the generated code in qtjambi_core.h and friends. If you have 

Maybe this is going against the goals of Qt Jambi, but it might be nice 
to have pretty documentation for the C++ JNI functions (all those 
qtjambi_* functions) like there is for the Qt C++ docs, and Jambi javadocs.

I must admit, Jambi overall has a very polished feel for something that 
is so new (in comparison to Qt which we all know/expect to be well 
polished since it's been around forever). I'm guessing that you just 
haven't yet figured out all of the ways that we (developers at large) 
might want to use the generator or other low-level JNI bits, what 
problems commonly arise and what questions are frequently asked. So, 
I'll (also) continue with my original thread of questions and maybe that 
will help highlight areas where developers may often become stumped. Or 
you'll tell me that I'm better off learning Visual Basic ;)

Phew! Too many words! Hope that helps anyway,

-Adam Batkin