Using the Grid Plug-in

A Grid plug-in is an Isight metamodel plug-in. To build one, you must write one or more files declaring appropriate Java classes; compile them to produce Java .class files, write an XML definition of the plug-in metamodel and its configuration properties; bundle the XML, .class files, and other supporting files (image files, internationalized messages, etc.) into a metamodel jar file; and publish it in Isight.

This section describes writing the Java classes. Once these are compiled, the rest of the procedure is completed using the Isight SDK Generator. For more information, see Overview of Creating a Plug-In.

To create a Grid plug-in, you must define Java classes that implement two interfaces: GridPlugin and GridOptionsPanel (both located in the package com.engineous.sdk.grid). The class for GridPlugin must implement the set of methods (described in detail in this section) that is used by Isight to dispatch runs to the other framework, monitor their execution, and retrieve the results. It must also define methods to get and set configuration property values as well as methods required by the basic plug-in interface. Since the latter methods are common to all Grid plug-ins, Isight includes a general class, AbstractGridPlugin, which provides standard implementations for them. This section assumes that your GridPlugin class merely extends AbstractGridPlugin and only describes the framework-specific methods you must implement.

The class for GridOptionsPanel must implement a GUI component through which a Grid plug-in’s configuration properties can be edited. The editor of a component that supports Grid plug-ins must display an instance of this component when the user selects your plug-in type (for example, the OS Command Component Editor must display an instance on its Grid tab).